This route presents a near-continuous panoply of changing vistas over Lake Tahoe, Fallen Leaf Lake, Emerald Bay, and Desolation Wilderness, all leading to a grand finale atop the summit. Mile for mile, it's one of the Sierra's most magnificent trails and arguably the premier hike of the Tahoe region.



Our trail starts at about 6,440 feet on an old forest road, behind the bulletin board where day-use wilderness permits are available. Gently ascending through a brushy landscape of sage, huckleberry, oak and conifer, we obtain our first really great view a little more than half a mile into the walk, where the trail mounts to a hogback ridge high above Fallen Leaf Lake.



Languorous, long and blue in its glacial valley, Fallen Leaf Lake is a textbook example of a moraine-dammed lake. Beyond the moraine at the lake's north end sprawls Lake Tahoe, larger than life, and bluer than blue. Views of Mount Tallac meanwhile open between the thick-trunked junipers, silver pines and Jeffrey pines that give majesty and shade to this surprisingly narrow ridge spine. Even if you go no farther than this magnificent ridge, the hike is already worth the price of admission.

As we continue, the trail makes a short descent westward into the shallow valley of Spring Creek, and then starts up again on short switchbacks, past the sign-posted boundary of Desolation Wilderness, to the heavily wooded shore of Floating Island Lake. These quiet waters take their name from the mats of pond weeds floating on the surface. It seems to be a very popular picnic spot for mosquitoes.

We find some relief from the blood-suckers by climbing upward into the drier forest, brush and granite landscape. After stepping across Cathedral Creek, we meet a junction with the steep path that descends to Fallen Leaf Lake and go right (south). Meager in size and hemmed in by boulders, Cathedral Lake floods the bottom of a narrow cirque just beyond.

Now we begin a steeper ascent into upper Cathedral Basin, switchbacking on a handsome trail through alternating tracts of rocks, brush and woods. Rambunctious Cathedral Creek crosses the trail in slapdash fashion, the trail and creek actually sharing the same bed briefly as they cut capers through a forest glen where corn lilies and willows grow rampant.

Emerging from the woods into a cirque choked with rocks and willows, we come face to face with the headwall of Cathedral Basin, an intimidating barricade of scree. This section never fails to prove to be the steepest and most pig-headed of the entire trail, even if the lofty views are ever more sublime. Initially cutting a diagonal northward up the scree, the official trail makes a sharp switchback south about a third of the way up. Because snowfields sometimes linger on the trail ahead well into July, many hikers seeking to avoid it have worn a use trail north through the scree from this switchback. Both trails eventually meet atop the headwall, but for the record, I found the official trail easier to manage; and besides, rangers encourage hikers to stick to official trails.



Atop the headwall you will find yourself in a vast, rocky, open, rolling meadow, with fine views of the Crystal Range along the western horizon. To the north rises the rather uncharismatic backside of Mount Tallac. It is now just a matter of steady walking uphill through meadow and copse, approaching ever closer to the rocky summit. Immediately below the summit block we meet the junction to Gilmore Lake. We turn right (east) and climb to the edge of the windy northern cliffs that overlook Lake Tahoe. Taking care not to get blown over, we make a brief and airy scramble to the metamorphic summit at 9,735 feet and 4.8 miles from the trailhead.



Mount Tallac offers a front-row seat on a real-life, full-scale relief map of the Tahoe Basin. You can pick out scores of defining points, the most obvious being Emerald Bay, Cascade Lake, Fallen Leaf Lake, Mount Rose (10,776'), Freel Peak (10,887'), and the miniscule towers of South Lake Tahoe. To the southwest rolls Desolation Wilderness beneath the point of Pyramid Peak (9,983'), to the southeast the High Country around Carson and Ebbetts passes.

Freelance writer Barry Parr is the author of Hiking the Sierra Nevada, published by Falcon, an imprint of The Globe Pequot Press.

For Hikers
To reach the trailhead: Drive 3.9 miles northwest on CA 89 from the junction with U.S. 50 at the South Lake Tahoe Y. Opposite the Baldwin Beach turn-off, a sign for the Mount Tallac Trailhead directs you left (south) on unpaved Mount Tallac Road. Follow the narrow road 1.1 miles to the Mount Tallac Trailhead.

Distance: 9.6 miles roundtrip.

Permit: Obtain a free permit for day-hikers at the trailhead. Overnighters need to get a wilderness permit (fee charged) from the Lake Tahoe Visitor Center.

Maps: See Fine Edge Productions map of South Lake Tahoe Basin--Tom Harrison: Lake Tahoe.

Trail Contacts: Lake Tahoe Visitor Center: 530.543.2674; Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit: 530.543.2600 or www.fs.fed.us/r5/ltbmu/contact.

Tahoetopia editor's note: This article is from the July/August 2008 issue of Sierra Heritage Magazine.

The story and photography are by Barry Parr. To subscribe to Sierra Heritage (founded in 1984), go to www.Sierraheritage.com.