Day 70: Fourth of July in South Lake Tahoe

The family went to Sharkey's Casino in Gardnerville for a hefty inexpensive breakfast in the AM while I slept in. Apparently the cook was overworked and pissed off so the food quality was a lot lower than usual. Once we were all together we headed up the hill to Stateline for the day. By then it was lunchtimes so we hit up the Fat Burger inside Harrah's for lunch as well as throwing a couple dollars into the slot machines.

Properly fed we headed to the Heavenly Gondola for a ride up to the peak. They were completely enclosed so it felt like being in a hot little greenhouse on the way up and down.


The first stop is a viewing platform with fabulous lake views.


The final stop is the Heavenly ski area with shops and restaurants which, being a holiday, were all closed up. I accidentally stepped into a stream of snow melt while we were up there so I got to do some impromptu stomping around in the streams. It was chilly but refreshing. Back down in Stateline we decided to park the van at a hotel where Grace works and wait out sunset there by the pool. I was the only one who got significantly wet because the water was pretty cold. We ordered a pizza for dinner and were able to 'buy' beer from Jessica, the receptionist/bartender at the hotel who likes Grace enough to let her whole family use the hotel's pool. It was a pretty sweet deal. The hotel is also located right by the beach.


Grace had gotten us a beach pass from Jessica that allowed us access to a private beach that had a very good view of the fireworks show. It was crowded but the view was still good.


The show was great. There were quite a few fireworks I hadn't seen before (smiley faces and odd colors) and it went on for quite a while. All in all it was a pretty cool fourth. The only minor disappointment is that I didn't get to light a single firework all day!