Saturday at South Lake Tahoe - part 2 - Cruise on MS Dixie II

Saturday was the actual date of Steve and Nancy's 50th anniversary, so we had a dinner sunset cruise planned on Lake Tahoe.

The anniversary couple

Our whole group!

Nancy and Steve with children and grand children

A bus brought us to the dock where we would board the paddlewheeler, MS Dixie II, for our sunset dinner cruise.

We had five tables in the early dining time:

Carl, Sheila and KC, Nancy and Bob

Son Ray and Anna, Nancy and Steve, grandchildren Jaden and Reed

Peter and Rowan, Diane and Ron, grandson Ezra and daughter Karen

Dave and Doris, Jan, Ethan, Inez and Gary

Melissa and Debi, Debbie and Mary, Sarah and Rebecca

After a delicious dinner on the first deck, we headed up to see more of the scenery around us.

Lake Tahoe is a deep freshwater lake in the midst of the Sierra Nevada mountains.

Information about Lake Tahoe (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Tahoe):

Lake Tahoe is a freshwater lake in the Sierra Nevada of the Western United States, straddling the border between California and Nevada. Lying at 6,225 ft above sea level, Lake Tahoe is the largest alpine lake in North America, and at 122,160,280 acre⋅ft, it trails only the five Great Lakes as the largest by volume in the United States. Its depth is 1,645 ft, making it the second deepest in the United States after Crater Lake in Oregon (1,949 ft).

On deck 2, there was a lounge with two fellows playing instruments and singing and a small dance floor.

Looking off the stern from the top deck

Looking toward the front on the top deck

Obligatory selfie 1

Obligatory selfie 2

Gary offered to take our picture.

Steve and Nancy, Inez and Gary

We entered Emerald Bay -- where we could see the resulting gash in the mountain side from a land slide in March, 2023.

The paddlewheel on our boat

Vikingsholm (http://vikingsholm.com/)

Sunset colors behind us captured by Inez

It was a sunset cruise, and we enjoyed the sunset...

... not as gorgeous colors as we might have hoped, but still beautiful.

Looking toward South Lake Tahoe where we were staying (with the moon up above at the edge of the picture).

Sunset colors at Zephyr Cove, where we returned to the dock and our waiting busses.

What a beautiful evening, celebrating Nancy and Steve!

Saturday at South Lake Tahoe - part 1

Nancy had lots of recommendations of things for us to do at the Margaritaville Resort at South Lake Tahoe...

We started at the breakfast buffet... 

Biscuits and gravy, scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage and a corny dog!

We were able to take over an expansion area of the restaurant in the atrium for our large group!

After breakfast, we walked down to the CVS with a couple of our friends...

... a view of the front of our hotel as we returned to it...

... obligatory selfie!

A look out of the window of our room toward the Marriott resort that was right behind our hotel.

We decided to take a walk down to the lakeshore. As we headed out, we were intrigued by the carriages out front...

"Tahoe Carriage"

We talked with the driver of the "horseless carriage" for a little while -- he said that they use horses in the winter with the sleighs, and they use carriages with horses before summer, but once it gets a little warm, they find that the visitors get concerned about the heat and the care of the horses, so they switch to the horseless carriages.

A couple other horseless carriages that were out in front of the hotel

Carl was interested in how they were powered -- electric motor...

... and lithium battery.

Friends Sheila and KC came out and we asked if they would like to walk down to the lake shore with us, and they were up for it... we had been cautioned by other friends that you couldn't actually get to the lake -- it was fenced off and there was a $30/person admission charge to access the beach (!!!!). We decided to walk down anyway...

Carl was able to get good pictures through the fence...

It is a very pretty lake!

There were a number of people for whom the $30/person was worth it!

It appeared that a wedding would be occurring at an events area at the lake.

As we walked back up the hill, Carl got a picture of our hotel with the mountain behind it.

Those were our daytime activities on Saturday. More about our evening activities in another post!

Heading west to celebrate friends!

On Friday morning, we headed west on I-80 on our way to South Lake Tahoe, California, to join in the celebration of Steve and Nancy's 50th wedding anniversary.

We rode with Gary and Inez in their nice Ford diesel pickup truck -- Carl drove part of the way, so renewed his experience driving a dually!

We were all staying at the Margaritaville Resort...

The front room of our suite

The bedroom with its huge king-sized bed

Looking back toward the front -- the window in the front looked out onto the atrium

Huge bathroom!

Huge shower!

We figured that the suite was about twice as big as our living space in Gracie!

The atrium out from our room

Another part of the atrium where the swimming pool and breakfast buffet was located

Another view of the atrium out from our room -- there was a pretty staircase from the second floor down to the main floor.

Nancy and Steve with her cousin and his wife

Nancy with cousin Ron and Bob and Nancy Balyeat (on the left) and friend Doris (on the right)

Nancy did an amazing job of planning and organizing the whole weekend -- more pictures to come of the rest of the weekend and all the other activities! 

Drone-action at Welcome Station

Carl got our drone because he wanted to be able to take pictures of our campsites at our various stops. On Thursday morning, he got the drone out to take a picture of our site after many of the other campers had left. 

Our site with some of our friends around

He sent it up to do a "follow me" and took a video of it "chasing" him around: https://youtu.be/rwAMHPi49Wo

Some neighbors at the campground

There are horses in the pasture directly behind the Welcome Station campground, and one of the mares had a foal just a couple of weeks ago...

The whole group was up under one of the trees at the edge of the pasture...

... what a cutie!

The horses belong to the owner of the neighboring property, but we get to enjoy seeing them from the campground!

Breakfast together at the rally

Wednesday was our last official day of the rally, and we shared breakfast together...

Carl cooked up a couple of pounds of bacon on Jan's Blackstone grill.

A big spread of food for breakfast!

We enjoy fellowshipping together, and part of fellowshipping is eating together!

Miss Kitty's visitor

Nancy and Steve's dog, Pepper, *loves* kitty cats... seeing kitty cats, sniffing kitty cats... She always wants to come and sniff at our door, and, if the door is open, to come in and *see* the kitty inside. She *knows* that there is a kitty inside.

Miss Kitty is not quite so fond of Pepper...

Usually Pepper just finds where Miss Kitty is and puts her nose up to Miss Kitty's nose for a couple of seconds, and that's good enough. On this day, however, I had sat on the couch with Miss Kitty on one side of me, and Pepper jumped up on the other side... 

I don't know if you can tell by Pepper's expression, but I think that Miss Kitty must have communicated in some way (no hissing or growling or meowing (or barking) involved) that Pepper was not a welcome addition to the couch!

There were no overt issues or words spoken, and Pepper has come back other times and they have touched noses with no problem!