Catch - up post number 4, cont'd, 4th of July fun in Lake Tahoe

Our first weekend in Reno, AKA, "The biggest little city in the world" happened to be the 4th of July. We decided to go explore Lake Tahoe and ventured to a cool hike and then stayed to see the "supposed to be biggest ever fireworks" but I think they miss-printed their flyers... I wasn't so impressed!

This first picture is driving up to Lake Tahoe, it's so beautiful up there.

Then, onward to our hiking destination which was about 15 miles south of Lake Tahoe. The name of the hike is called "horse tail" because there is a waterfall that looking from a distance looks like a long horsetail. The waterfall followed the hike the entire way up. Here's a few pictures of how cool of a hike it was... if you come visit, we will take you :)

So pretty...

So, we climbed down to stand "in" or close to the water. There was a big boulder in the bottom that looked pretty stable to stand on for a picture. In the middle of my oh so cute pose, I started leaning backwards! The big boulder that should have been stable, was very deceiving... none the less...

It made me react like the below picture. You can't tell by the picture, but my heart was racing very fast after that happened over fear I would fall in!

After my near fall into the water, we continued the never ending hike, but we eventually made it to the top of the hike where we came to the lake where the waterfall started from. About 3/4 of the way up to the lake, I was surely ready to give up - it was a very hard hike, and would it be that worth it? And, I kept looking down thinking, "we are never going to find our way down from here!" After we made it about half way to the top, the hike turned into big boulders of granite. On the way up to the lake, we kept seeing these home made "trail markers" made of rocks piled 4-5 high. I thought that was pretty cool (I guess I'm an inexperienced hiker) so I added a few myself to the collection - and then we kept going. But, once at the top, there were amazing views and it was so peaceful up there! It was worth it!

Here's a few pics from the lake:

When we finally decided to make our way down, looking down at those big boulders of granite was so overwhelming for me! We in fact, headed down the wrong way one time to come to a dead end where we couldn't go any further because of a 20 foot drop off. So, we made our way back up and looked for our trail markers. (I will never go on a hike that doesn't have a trail without trail markers again!) It was such a relief to find them and then, someone that was very prepared had made trail markers with spray paint on the rocks.... so smart! We followed those for a little while until we couldn't see them anymore. At that point I got the following injury:

My legs were really tired and my feet slid out from under me. I was able to catch myself before sliding down a 10 foot drop, but managed to jab my finger into the rock and scrap up my knee in the process... ouch :)

We then came to a spot that it seemed as if we couldn't go any further due to a crevasse in the rocks... we decided we didn't have another way so Duke made it down giving me confidence to go next and FEW! we made it! Eventually down to the car where I could have drank a gallon of water...!

We made it to a local pizza shop, ate some dinner and then relaxed to see the not so big firework display! Over all, it was a great day!

Here's to the end of catch-up post number 4 and wishing you a happy 4th of July:)