What a fun trip!! Nature, chocolate, funny statues and Drew! Who could ask for anymore!

I need to have a GPS installed in my brain. I couldn't find my way out of a paper bag. I prefer to call myself directionally-challenged. It sounds so much nicer than the obvious alternatives.

So glad you had fun! YAY!

Thanks for the lovely pics. I will probably never to get to Lake Tahoe in my life so its nice to see photos of beautiful places. And going to Sweden twice by mistake sounds like a very fun way to spend a couple of afternoons, even if you did spend them with Mr. X.

Two things I love my GPS and Tahoe has been seen by me driving through it 15 times...but can we stop? NO we have to hurry and get where we are going so we can sit and wait.

Your trip sounds fabulous! I've never been to Lake Tahoe but seeing it makes me want to visit. Truthfully, I've never been further west than San Antonio and that was 25 years ago.

A few weeks ago my car was broken into and they stole my GPS. I feel lost (pun intended) without it even though I rarely used it because I rarely go anywhere besides my office. But still, I knew it was there and it made me feel better just knowing I could plug it in if I ever did venture out of my normal path.

Oh how beautiful! I feel your pain. I have absolutely no sense of direction whatsoever. I inherited it from my mom who once, on a trip to Eureka, Kansas from Dodge City, Kansas (to visit my uncle) turned herself around at a gas station....It wasn't until a few hours later, and a few questions from my brother and I, "Mommy, why aren't we there yet? Why does that sign say Dodge City on it?" that she then realized that we were heading home! She now has GPS thank God! But, I'm no better. I'm glad you had fun. Maybe I should go there on my next vacay.

CK is completely in love with his GPS. She is called Jane and TRUly understands him in a way I never can apparently . It would seem she doesn't raise her eyebrows when once again he asks if we are going the correct direction IN OUR HOMETOWN!!!
Also she speaks to him sometimes and he is the only one who can hear - they have a real connection!

I love road atlaseses too! I can look at any state at all, right there in alphabetical order. Although here in Pittsburgh we still have phonebooks. But we don't have movie times listed in the paper anymore either, and that ticks me off every time I want to see a movie.

I'm jealous of you getting to see Sweden twice accidentally! I don't think I would be too thrilled about driving through a tunnel under the ocean. The Chesapeake Bay Bridge-tunnel freaks me right the hell out.

Yea - someone else who appreciates a good map! I think GPS's tend to make us dumb - seriously - I was using one and almost turned down a one way going the wrong way. We just pay to much attention to that little voice.

Looks like a great trip hope it was wonderful!!

I'm with you on the GPS thing. My husband loves his, but I find it infuriating, especially if detoured by construction (zoom in, you can't see where you are in relation to the highway you're supposed to be on; zoom out, and you can't see the back roads you're lost on after being detoured off the highway), or want to take a different route (no, I want the Tappan Zee, not the GW). That, and no one's ever broken into my car to steal my map. Glad you enjoyed your trip and your alternate route!

I learned to read a map by getting the family from some creatively reached location to wherever it was we were supposed to be. Once I got good at that, I was allowed to take the map and decide which "little gray road" (translation - tiny little, possibly unpaved, but almost guaranteed to lead to something cool road) we were going to drive down next. Those were the best vacations! Also, IMO, GPS is great for geocaching, but I can do without it in my car.

Tahoe is very nearly as gorgeous as Rangeley. (In case you have not been reading my blog religiously which I know you do, maybe I should say for the benefit of all your wonderful readers, that's Rangeley, Maine, which also has a lake and trees and mountains, only smaller ones, and a convenient proximity to Canada which we visited without even getting lost. By sheer coincidence Grant was driving.)

Once upon a time here in good old Massachusetts on the most direct route to Maine there were three different highways, 1, 128, and 95, that became the same road for three miles and then went their happy separate ways again. If you are thinking, "bottleneck for the ages," give yourself a gold star. So to avoid this we would go up 95 north to 93 north, which was really north-northwestish, to 495 north, which was really northeastish, back to 95 again. (You needn't try to remember the numbers, we were basically hanging a left and going around a really big block to avoid the bottleneck.) So the night before Thanksgiving my sister set out for my folks' in Portland, Maine, only she got on 93 and never got off until she ran out of gas in Loon, New Hampshire, which, granted, is in the same country but nowhere near the state where she wanted to be, and she said good thing she did run out of gas or she would have wound up in Montreal, which is not in the same country. Now, I am famous in my family for having no sense of direction, and I have missed the street and even occasionally the city, but I've never missed a whole state, especially the biggest one we have around these parts.

Happy Monday! Please feel free to visit these parts any time; I'll be here all year. (I keep saying that and you keep going places like Rome instead, but I am not easily discouraged.)

Re-tox? HAHAHAHA!

Laurie, you need to come out of the twentieth century and get a GPS. First of all, you don't get lost anymore. It might be fun when you are on your own -- but as you surely must remember, couples do not do well together when they get lost on trips. So, either remain single or accept the fact of the GPS. Actually, the GPS is not bad to have when you are single either. My GPS's voice is that of a really hot British woman.

And Lake Tahoe is very pretty. Weren't there any REAL planes that go from LAX to Reno?

Ha Ha
If you think Tahoe is pretty now - wait till January when it is covered in snow!!! Then it is pretty AND you wear scarves and love hot tubs.

But not at the same time.

You ARE an adventurer! I love your Sweden story. It reminds me of driving in Scotland for 3 hours and ending up right we started. We had a blast though. We found a really cool whiskey distillery.

BTW, you look great in those sunglasses.

Oh and Lucia, I was in Rangeley, Maine about 20 years ago and it is indeed GORGEOUS! And we woke up to a lovely partial bottle of wine our friendly RV neighbors left for us when they hit the road. Who doesn't finish a bottle of wine?

Beautiful pix!
And just in case you thinks GPS's take all the adventure out of traveling, ours just had us drive 2+ miles through a corn field in Northern MI to get to the main road. Seriously.

Neil, you know what kind of people I like most? The ones who let me be me without always and forever trying to tell me what to do, buy, see, say or think. That includes GPS voices, too.

Because if you haven't discovered it by now I am five years old on the inside and the more someone tries to INSISTENTLY tell me what to do the more I deliberately keep going on my merry way. Just to piss them off. I am terribly mature this way.

In fact, if I never heard another "should" the rest of my life it would be too soon.

LOL! I am willing to contribute a small amuont of money--very small--to see you actually get to Sweden, where you MUST go. Clearly. Must.

My first (and only) to Lake Tahoe was last summer and I absolutely fell in love with the beauty of the place.

One time, driving from Germany to Belgium, we ended up in an unexpected country. We had taken the wrong autobahn and drove through the Netherland's little hangy-down part. It was only a little longer. The European Union sure makes it easy to drive there -- no border checks for ordinary tourists.

We used to go the North shore, the CA side, every summer when I was a kid, and my parents would torment me by driving around the lake to get to the South shore so they could gamble and I would invariably get car sick. It is still marvelously under-developed and beautiful, with the heavenly smell of pine trees and it always impressed me that the lake is bottomless, at least according to scientific people who know such things. Also full of crayfish.

I'm jealous of your traveler/adventurer spirit, what with going all alone to Italy over Valentine's and all. Wow. That'd be something for me to work on doing eventually. Right now when I travel and it's just me and my teenage son, I get incredibly lonely and crave adults to talk to.

And yay for map reading abilities! On my way to Iowa in July, I was detoured through KC that was a very poorly, poorly marked detour and I pulled out my handy dandy ATLAS and figured out what to do all on my own. All those summer vacations navigating in the front seat for mom or dad paid off, I guess. Darnit! They were teaching me life skills! Who knew?

After this weekend I am IN LOVE with the GPS. My husband and I drove RIGHT TO our intended destinations and had so much extra time from not getting lost, that we were able to do TWICE as much fun stuff! Plus I like to watch the pretty blue dot move along the route. Ha.

Lake Tahoe is absolutely gorgeous! Be warned, however, that in the winter you may need chains wrapped around your tires to give you traction in the snow. There are men at the side of the road to put them on for you, but my Mr. X and I were up there one time and had to remove them ourselves. It was not pretty and the chains were never the same.
Now we know where the Dude went to recharge his creative batteries!

I can't stop giggling about accidentally visiting Sweden twice!

Lake Tahoe is, indeed, stunningly beautiful. I was there for a wedding in February last year, and it's one of the more gorgeous places I've ever seen. And aside from Expedia losing the husband's plane ticket and having to buy him a second, three times as expensive ticket at the last minute or miss the wedding, and missing our flight and having to spend the night unexpectedly in Salt Lake City, and waking up the day after the wedding to 12 inches of snow and a continuing blizzard, and having to go down the mountains a different way because they were blasting for avalanches on the normal road, and the fact that there are no guard rails on many of those mountain roads because they spoil the view so we almost drove into the lake at one point during a white out, and getting stranded in Reno for two extra days because our flight was cancelled one day and there was another blizzard the next day and so we had to spend extra time at a casino on Delta's dime, which was fun the first night but not so fun the second day when we were out of clean clothing and had to buy clothes at the Harley store just to have something to wear, and wondering if Reno would ever let me leave, it was an awesome trip!

I was in Tahoe the weekend before you! It is lovely, isn't it? Luckily for me, it is only one and a half hours drive from my house.

On the topic of maps, we were at Sea World earlier this year and had one of the maps of the park and the only one in our family who could find anything was my 9 year old son. The rest of us would stare at the map, make a plan, and end up at the wrong place.

I love paper maps - I have two old National Geographic ones on my wall in my room...well, only one right now because I thought I should grow up and put up a picture of two. I love driving maps, probably all based on loving paper things...books, the funnies, maps etc., You are such an adventurer. Tahoe looks crispy dreamy - glad you had a good getaway.

I think bonus points are in order for 1) finding the lake and 2)not ending up in Sweden. I'm horrible with driving directions, computerized or real :/

If you had to get up at the buttcrack of dawn, you were not mentally "all there" by the time you were driving. Do yourself a favor and occasionally use a GPS. The right one makes the trip stress free. The right one doesn't yell at you if you change their chosen route - it just recalculates. Tahoe is beautiful - and they think their water is polluted!?!

For a minute I thought you were going to end up explaining how you got lost in Nevada and ended up in Sweden again! Now THAT would be a story!

I knew someone who left Kansas for Minnesota one morning. Late in the evening he was seen where he started (in Kansas). He said he got to a sign for Dallas and realized he'd gone the wrong direction. (I can't fathom how fast he must have been driving.)

Of course the plural of atlas is atli. The plural of cactus is cacti. The plural of kleenex is kleeni (don't you know). I'll refrain from going on, as you're already fluent in these plural forms!

You really are a trip!!! Just remember... You're not LOST, you're EXPLORING!!! That's what I would say when trying to find an alternate back-road route home. If you can find where you are on a map, you're not lost, just misplaced!!

HEE!!

I wanna go!

I know how you feel about Sweden.

I, personally (and my daughter, too), have a problem where if we get lost or something goes wrong, we wind up in Pittsburg.

It's like the Twilight Zone or something. As soon as we see a sign that says Pittsburg, we know that something has gone horribly wrong.

By the way, there's nothing wrong with planes that have propellers. All the planes I've flown have had propellers, and they flew just fine.

Wow! What a fabulous trip! I envy you! And you just happened to run into friends! What luck!

I was in Lake Tahoe last week (8/14-8/17). It was BEAUTIFUL!! We stayed in a lake front condo and rented a boat. It's not like the lakes here in the Central Valley of California. We even saw Alan Jackson in concert at Harvey's outdoor arena. It's amazing how a short visit there can renew your spirit!! Sounds like you had a wonderful time too!!

I'm with you. If you don't get lost, you can never find new places and you'll never have great stories to share.

I was laughing the whole time I was reading!

I was lucky enough to go to Tahoe once, many years ago. My cousin got married out there (actually he got married at the Pondarosa!). My siblings and I flew from the East Coast out to San Francisco and then drove to Lake tahoe. There was no GPS back then - at least not in the civilian world. My cousin's car was euqiped with an altimiter and it was so oddly enthralling to watch it as we climbed up and down the mountains. I know I missed a lot of great scenery watching that thing. Tahoe was beautiful and I'd love to go back someday...

I'm jealous of Lake Tahoe, and Sweden (times 2). That is exactly how I like to vacation-winging it completely. It's more fun! We've been lost on our way to a campground or two and found some really great places we never would have seen.

Hubster used to fly those small, noisy and very dangerous puddle-jumpers, and according to him they are more reliable and maybe even more safe than your average 747. He loved to fly them, and misses them a lot now that he's moved up to the big leagues ;). They certainly aren't glamorous though-I get a headache everytime I'm on one.

I once was driving from Amsterdam to Paris and somehow accidentally ended up in Germany. This is very disturbing for a Jew...

Ooh! Didn't realize there is a Chocolate Nugget in Reno! I always stop at the one in Mound House, hey, free samples! And really if you were going to Stateline 395 is quicker then 431, but incline is beautiful! Not that I've been to Lake Tahoe... and I live 2 hours away... Did you at least hit Jimmy Beans or Deluxe Yarns in Reno? ;)

I'm with you on the maps! I have several shoved under my center consul. Though my reno map is laminated, I use it a lot, if anything just to find where they hid whole foods (yes I drive a hour for whole foods and trader joes, nothing wrong with that!) Hope you enjoyed your trip, and next time in Nevada, go east on 50, feel free to say hi to me on the way, but you sooo need to see the shoe tree!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/alittlequacky/2504106522/in/set-72157604378294717/

If only I had known you were here... I live less than an hour away, I could have met you for some nice adult beverage!

Laurie - My LOVE of maps began when I was very young and driving to and from Grandma's house. To quiet the ADD in me(now I know that) my mom would give me the map and I could _see_ how far it was, how far we had gone, and where we were coming up to. All this from Western Kansas to Central Kansas. (always through Greensburg) :(
After my folks died and the eleven kids divided up the house, one of my first choices was the 'cupboard of maps' (really). I have had such fun looking at all of them - there were two atlassess, atli, atlee, books of maps without the states of Alaska or Hawaii. That is OLD!
My parents were just as goofy about maps as they made me!!!
I also had, for years, the National Geographic maps up on my walls. How else are you to figure out the place about which people are talking?
I am a hairstylist, and my first boss told me she didn't know how anyone could run a salon without an atlas and a dictionary. I have both a U.S. atlas, and a World atlas at my station, a giant million word crossword dictionary, and a very small practically worthless paperback gradeschool dictionary. I love maps and words!!!
I love your stories, also. You _should_ ; ) not ever listen to those other people who want to tell you what is right for you.
You GO girl!!

Oh Purl, Sweden - Twice? Tahoe. My grandparents had a cabin at Tahoe when I was a child. The clear pine smell is what I remember most. And the freakin cold water in the lake! Thanks for reminding me.

How weird, I am going to be in South Lake Tahoe NEXT weekend! I love it up there! I wish I could find a job there and then live up in the trees full time. I also am in serious need of one of those car-GPS navigation systems. Because, although I make maps for a living, I have a terrible sense of direction. :)

Tahoe, Sweden, Drew and Horizon? What more could you want? Hmmm...

Yes the in room jacuzzi tub is THE GREATEST! Especially if you have a mini-fridge that you can reach while still in the tub. I once went on vacation in the mountains and was shocked to discover that my jacuzzi tub was in the bathroom and you not only couldn't reach the fridge from there - you couldn't see the TV! I know! Who puts a jacuzzi in a room and doesn't put it near the tv?

Awesome stories! Thanks for sharing.

OHMYGOD I do love you youre the bomb hahah I am so amazed at you and the large statue thing wow hah I am loving it ...once read a map Up side down and then there was a time when we went thru Washington DC three times before I realized we were not in Baltimore lol My daughter is still talking about that ( the Potomaic River should of been a give away da) I also went to Alabamia by accident too didn't realize I had left Ga. Until it said Welcome to Alabama lol GOod God I am something ... Sweden now that is cool lol thanks for making me laugh and glad I found your site yes Iam thanks once again for making my day . (0 :

I define "not lost" as "Got there eventually, regardless of how many unplanned side trips were taken along the way." This got me thru navigating on teeny country roads in England with my Mr. X. We found Cambridge, end of story. Isn't Reno just a terminally cute litte town? Pretty scenery all around the Tahoe area. I've never seen a bear up there, though, so I guess I'll have to keep going until I do. Glad you had a good trip!

During all of our childhood roadtrips, Dad's famous words were "We're heading in the right general direction." We were never lost, just taking short scenic detours. It's still the way I love to travel.

I've accidentally ended up in West Virginia when aiming toward Virginia, on the Eastern Shore of Maryland when I was looking for Pennsylvania, and North Carolina when I didn't even realize I had left Virginia! So, girl, we are sympatico!

My Mr. X has a GPS in his head -- you know, if you dropped him out of a helicopter and said "Head west" he'd know which was "west" was. I can't even imagine!

Tahoe is gorgeous. We take our kids there--we only live about 90 minutes away. I love CA!

Your navigation skills sound like mine. My husband is forever exasperated with my attempts at map-reading.

I fully support the getting lost method of getting places. Granted, I live in New England and don't drive, so eventually I'll come across something I recognize even if it is just the ocean!

I'm about to take a trip to an exotic place (ha! Sioux Falls, SD!)

Boyfriend wants to get out of town, and he picked Sioux Falls. Since I love the state of South Dakota, I readily agreed to go with him. I cant wait. I'd been wanting to go back to SD and see things that we drove past on our way to the Black Hills last year, I'm sad that I dont get to see the Badlands again, or nearly get hit by a Bison the size of a small Hummer (in Custer State Park, it was on the side of the road, and running TOWARDS the road, and the car we were in)

But, still, I'm going to visit a town that I only drove past and didnt even stop to use the potty there last year. AND, we're going to sneak over to Minnesota on our last day and visit a state park only for the reason that the picture I saw of it was so pretty that I just had to go see it myself. (didnt even have to talk the boyfriend into it)

I just hope I have enough money to buy cheap, meaningless gifts to give to my parents when I get back. (the expensive meaningless gifts are usually too expensive for me)

LOL!!

Who cares about Rick Steves - I'd much rather read your travelogue than his.

:-)
Sue

You look like a movie star with the sunglasses and scarf!

I did the same thing the last time I was in Reno. Sort of. Our first clue that we were going the wrong way was the "Welcome to California" sign. Wait a minute, aren't we supposed to be in Nevada? Ooops.

Oh my gosh...i can't remember the last time i laughed so hard!! That's awesome. I am totally the person who gets everyone lost on road trips...do not let me drive....

You crack me up and I agree with you about the GPS. I love maps. We have a pile in the car - at the ready for any occasion- fortunately my partner is always up for the road less taken and never panics or evens gets mad when we stray from the path of destination. Of course this is after I travelled from western to eastern Canada in the very early eighties and because I got kinda lost and miscalculated my gas consumption, I had to beg a gas attendent to accept my funny Canadian money. Man did I pay a lot for that tank.
Keep taking those unintentional side trips - they often turn out to be the best.

Hahaha! I have to brag - Lake Tahoe is a day trip for me! I love it up here and after living ten years down in Orange Cnty - I will never move back. The air quality (not to mention the traffic - which I'm sure you noticed)- well, there is no comparison. Come on - I live within 50 miles of at least 6 different ski areas!

Anyway - I'm glad you were able to get away from the rat race that is SoCal. Its been a wonderful summer - clear and cooler than the last couple of years. Did you get a chance to visit our LYS - Jimmy Beans Wool?

If you had not gotten lost, then you could not say "I've been to Sweden, TWICE."

For me, being lost is nowhere near as interesting. I usually end up at the wrong end of wherever I was supposed to be!

You make me laugh!!! My Husband, 2 kids and I just got back from a 2 week driving vacation circumnavigating Nevada! :)
Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Utah, Arizona, California, Oregon and thank goodness, Washington.
When we got into Cal. I thought there were fires near by, no, just smog. :) I thought of you often, and honestly, how do you all deal with that heat? I will admit that Moab, Utah had the highest temp of the trip with 107, but really?
Really?
I'm glad your trip went so well and it was fun visiting the land of Crazy Aunt Purl!

There are chocolate mines in Nevada? I'm there.

Obviously you should book a trip to Sweden - Sweden is calling you!

I am SERIOUSLY geographically-impaired. Fortunately, the DH reads maps the way some people read bodice-busters and rarely gets lost. NEVER gets lost, excuse me...but occasionally makes a little directional mistake. I would be afraid of a GPS on account of I, too, would feel inclined to look straight at it and chat. Sounds like a FAB vacay, though! MAZEL TOV! We're going to the UP in Michigan next week...I knit, doze, read; he drives. Good deal! (The truth though? Northern Minnesota, Northern Wisconsin...those are the prototypes for Heaven. Has something to do with "Gitchee Goomie" (Lake Superior). Believe me, I know. I'm old.

Every time I drove from my home (for awhile) in Madison, Wisconsin, to my parents' home in Pittsburgh, I would go to Michigan. Which is not on the direct route, you betcha. What it is is where you go if you're in the wrong lane on the freeway at the wrong time. The people in the McDonalds right across the Illinois/Michigan border used to say, "Oh, hi. GOing to see your parents again?"

Glad you had a nice vacation. Getting there is half the fun!

Isn't Tahoe grand? I have a pic of Emerald Bay that almost looks like yours - funny that given that there about 200 gawking tourists all taking pics from the same vista point. LOL
(I don't need a GPS. I admit to having a husband who likes navigating but despises driving, whilst I love driving. Oh and I don't have a car, which makes the driving thing tricky.)

You know, those GPS machines are not always all they're cracked up to be. The one on my rental car directed me to some backroads that, while they got me to my brother's place, was sort of a bizarre path to take and during the winter would NOT have been a good idea. At least I didn't end up in Sweden. Which would have rocked, actually.

The plane you took is actually larger than the ones I normally take. One was so small the curtains to the cockpit were open and you could see the snow hitting the windshield. It was like being in a giant airborne station wagon.

I LOVE maps! When I was a kid my dad pasted maps all over his den including one on the ceiling. I used to lie on the floor and stare up at the map for hours. I think this maybe why I'm good with geo-trivia. I do have a very good sense of direction and I think that is something that you are just born with - nature not nurture. I recently took a trip with a friend that has a Garmin GPS and I really enjoyed the feature where you can type in say "Starbucks" and it tells you where every Starbucks is within 50 miles (or whatever) - that was cool. The thing that I found disturbing however is top the "map" on a GPS
is whatever direction you're headed instead of NORTH! Treason! As a map person this was just plain freeking crazy!! Its just not right.

I rode in one of those little prop planes when I went to Europe earlier this summer. And all the way out to the tarmac I kept praying that they wouldn't put me on a plane with propellers. Lo and behold, I get on the smallest plane out there with 20 people (including the 2 pilots and the stewardess). Turned out it was actually a pretty nice flight. I'm glad someone else is as paranoid as I am about getting on tiny planes!

LOL so well said ...

I sure hope you checked out the Chocolate Nugget and didn't just take a picture of the sign. Lovely store. If they also sold yarn I'd never leave. Glad you had a good time on vacation, even if you took the scenic route to get there.

I'm a great fan of adventures (also known as making the wrong turn somewhere). And clean air can be addictive. After moving to Crescent City, CA (on the coast, almost into Oregon), I visited the L.A. area nine months later and couldn't wait to get back to where I could breathe without my lungs hurting.

Mmm, beer, in the jacuzzi, whilst watching saved by the bell! That sound's like my kind of holiday!
I like maps too, much better than some silly machine that sounds like a retarded robotic barbie doll squawking at you!

Thank you for this post. It gave me a laugh which I sorely needed! Today, I was trying to embrace my own love of maps while driving around South Boston, for an hour and a half, looking for the Boston Common, which...FYI...is not in South Boston.

Lovely pictures too!

I'm with you on the GPS thing. I really LIKE the getting lost part....or as we say in my house, the ADVENTURE part of our vacations!

LOL!! love it.
We are in Australia and have just finished our annual four week road trip holiday.
Hubby was so fed up with my ahem "attempts" at reading the maps that he gave in and bought a GPS for this trip. After one week she was called the bitch cause she was always telling him what to do... (and as usual he never did it!!) and after three weeks she was thrown out the window.
And yes unfortunately I'am back reading the maps again.
I think of it not as getting lost but as taking the scenic route!! MUCH MORE FUN!
Lea-Anne in OZ

I had a good friend get married in Tahoe so I was able to explore the area a little. Pretty place! Truckee is an interesting little town. You learn more than you probably want about the Donner Party.

Also, there was an old-school casino (totally stuck in time) at the south end of the lake and it was the only time I have ever won at a casino. It was so much fun! And it was fun seeing a casino that was truly stuck in time. Cal-Nev Casino I think. Hey! It looks like it is still there! www.calnevaresort.com/

I think if I bought a gps my partner and I would cut down our fights by about 90%.

What a beautiful place - you are lucky!!

Hi, Laurie--Lake Tahoe! I am so jealous. I love that place, I visited last February. I can't wait to go back! I just have to prepare for the altitude next time, mo' betta.

And I am in full agreement about maps: They rock! Every year I have to buy an updated Rand McNally atlas. This is an essential in life, like cats, wine, beer and food. I am sure you understand. ;)

Have a great time!

I have a similar story where hubby and I did circles OVER the Kamehameha highway (totally spelled wrong) on Oahu. We could see it but we couldn't get to it. An hour and a half later (after divorce papers were drafted) we stopped to figure out which half of the rental car the other one would own when we looked up and saw the street sign that said we were actually on the correct highway. So sad.

Glad you bumped into friends. Vacations are better with company. :)

I received a Tom-Tom for Christmas last year because my mother knew I was moving to California and she knows only too well how I refuse to EVER stop and ask for directions. It is definitely a stubborn "man thing". I prefer getting lost WITH a map. But the little GPS system has helped me out a few times (even though I keep it off most of the time). One of my fondest traveling memories is getting lost with my college girlfriend while looking for Mammoth Cave. You would think with a name like "Mammoth" it would be very hard to miss. Had we had a GPS system "way back when" we probably wouldn't have ended up sleeping in a wig-wam road-side attraction....LOVED your book Purl...waiting impatiently for the next one...

Nice to see that you've visited Sweden. Next time you should come here straight away, instead of by accident.

I prefer maps too!

OMG...Yes...all I need is ANOTHER f-ing voice in the car telling me how to drive...not a chance....NEVER!

Coming out of lurkville to tell you my uncle always says, "if there's gas in the tank, you ain't lost" (imagine a THICK country accent).

Mapquest is always giving me erroneous directions, so I wouldn't trust a GPS. I'd rather pull out the map and figure out my own route.

***sneaking back into lurkville***

Funny thing about Lake Tahoe....it's NEVER easy to get there. I drove from Sacramento with my parents and my sister through the highest freakin' mountain pass in CA and the whole time my dad was crouched down in the backseat of the car because he is WAY afraid of heights....and my mom white-knuckled the steering wheel the entire trip. Boy was that fun.

But the place itself is gorgeous and I would put up with a hang-glider to get me there if I was sufficently boozed up and assured of a jacuzzi tub when I got there.

Glad to see you had a wonderful time!

I never go anywhere anymore unless I'm picked up and taken there. Thusly, over a year ago, I had my first experience with a GPS when my sister picked me up on the way to a family reunion.

Their GPS [who I dubbed 'Louise'] was a crack up. She didn't like any deviations from 'her' route and at one point those of us in the car were in tears because she told us to make a u-turn and head back in the other direction!

Now, when someone in the family gets a GPS it is named by a family member who doesn't live with it. I started a tradition!

Tahoe IS beautiful. Another beautiful place is that hangout for the rich and famous in Colorado [whose name escapes me at the moment.]
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