[OT] - Winter Cycling Routes In South Lake Tahoe?

[Matt Egan]

Hey everyone, figured this is the best place I have to ask this question.

Gave up the SF apartment for the winter and will be living in a small cabin in South Lake through May! Still trying to find a Wahoo Kickr in stock, but I figured for now I can brave the "cold" and go out riding. However, it seems difficult to tell in advance (other than driving) which roads will be plowed and which will be icy. (I did try to find a plowing map but it's questionable in its accuracy).

Anyone have any route recommendations for the area? Is around the lake on the 89/50 my best bet?

Hope everyone is having a nice winter so far and I can't wait to be riding with you all again!

[John Murphy]

You can’t go around the Lake in winter on bike or car. The road over Emerald Bay is never plowed, they shut it down at first snow and that’s it. This is the section just north of the Y headed towards Homewood.

On that note you might find it ok to go out and back from the Y to the closure as the closure might limit traffic.

If the roads are clear - truly clear - you could in theory go up to Spooner summit (50 headed North/west from Stateline) as it is an exposed road (sun = snow melt) that gets plowed and heavy traffic (= snow melt). But please note that the descent back from Spooner is very high speed - easy to hit 50 MPH - and there are numerous scary drainage grates (not of doom but a rattler at speed) on the shoulder. One whiff of ice at that speed could be catastrophic.

Perhaps your best bet would be to rack up and drive to Woodfords and do the loop of the Diamond Valley road race. Maybe not plowed but that valley doesn’t see much snow. You could ride out near Minden on Fredericksburg and maybe climb partway up Kingsbury from that side - the Carson Valley is often dry even when Tahoe is buried.

One year when conditions were good I rode up the Mt Rose highway from Reno on Christmas Day. A great climb with very good pavement if clean, a great descent. If you time it away from ski traffic

John

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[Ken MacInnis]

I'd skip all that and take up XC skiing. Great cross-training, similar benefits to cycling, and it's damned peaceful. Royal Gorge and lots of other spots around. You can bike when the snow melts. 

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Ken MacInnis - kcm at clueful dot org - http://www.clueful.org/

[John Murphy]

+1

Another great idea is snowshoeing. 

[Matthew Blain]

Emerald Bay is very high avalanche danger and can be closed for days after a storm, but it's also a major highway and kept open all winter when conditions permit. Doubtful it's much fun to ride on however in winter.

Both South Lake and Truckee plow their bike paths. You can see a map here ('plowed winter path' layer). http://map.tahoebike.org/ , though I don't know the priority.

Though... it's probably mostly for commuting in S Lake. You will see people commuting by bike in the snow who do not have cars.

So yeah, fatbike on the snow, skis of various forms, snowshoes.

Or as noted, visit the Carson Valley.

[Georgia Andrews]

I've noticed the Truckee river bike path (the legacy trail) be plowed, but it's not like it scrapes off all the snow that fell and if it's not a lot they're not going to plow at all. So it's icy in the shady parts of the path and sometimes rutted so I'd want at least a mountain bike. The plowing also means there's very little shoulder even on the bigger roads. (i'm also not very adventurous in this way so you might think it's fine).

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[Reeve Dunne]

I've done the same and given the current snow conditions and weather the riding is currently great up here. 

On the road the riding south in Carson Valley is great, nice views and very few cars. This weekend we did about a loop starting south from the parking at the base of Kingsbury grade and following foothill to emigrant over to woodfords then back on Carson river road. You can probably find it on my Strava. 

If you have a trail bike Clear creek trail (and others in Carson) are actually riding better then the do in the summer as well.