canyonwalker: Planes, Trains, and Automobiles. Travel! (planes trains and automobiles)
When we went to Hawaii last month on a trip built around a timeshare presentation. Although we went in knowing there was 0% chance we were going to buy, new (yesterday's blog) the exercise did change my thinking a little on whether a timeshare, at the right price, is worth it for us. Here are Five Things I recommend anyone considering a timeshare consider before buying:

1) First, a timeshare is fractional ownership in a condominium. Maybe you already know this, but it's worth repeating. It's a real estate transaction. You are buying partial ownership in a property with the right to occupy it, say, one week per year. When you can stay that week may be limited by the terms of the contract and may also involve a lottery or first-come-first-serve reservation system.

2) Don't pay retail. As I explained in my previous blog on this topic, the timeshare industry manages to sell new timeshares for way more than they're worth. Second-hand timeshares— yes, you can resell them because they're real estate— can cost just half the new price and possibly way less.

But even once you find a good price there are still other factors to consider. You've got to compare the money you're spending on the mortgage / the opportunity cost of the cash you've bought it for, plus the annual maintenance fees, to other options for vacation accommodation.

3) Does a timeshare unit suit you better than a hotel? The first "compared to...' thought experiment I considered years ago was whether a timeshare is cheaper than just paying for a hotel room when on vacation. Unless you get a screaming deal on the timeshare price the answer is almost certainly No. But consider also that a timeshare unit gives you more than a hotel.

With a hotel you're getting a single room. (Yes, there are efficiencies and suites, but those can be way more expensive). With a timeshare you're getting, really, an apartment. It may be a 1-bedroom with a kitchen and living room, like the condo we had in Waikoloa, or it may have 2 bedrooms. The question, then, is whether you want/need the extra space.

When we were younger I thought, "Ha! No!" but now that I'm older— and more discerning from traveling a lot the past 15+ years— I see real value in a small apartment. And if you have kids, a 2-bedroom apartment is huge upgrade from a hotel room. In fact if you have a growing family you're probably looking at paying for two hotel rooms when you travel. At that point the cost of a timeshare can become favorable.

4) Do you want to go to the same place every year? I defined a timeshare in #1 above to emphasize that what you're buying is property. You're buying an interest in a specific condo tower, in a specific place. Do you want to go to the same place every year? Some people vacation like that, some don't.

To address that most timeshares belong to exchange networks that allow you to swap a week at your place for a week somewhere else. Trading by its nature is inefficient, though. I hear from relatives who own timeshares that they often up giving away their week or letting it go unused because they can't get out there to use it.

I suggest as a rule of thumb that you only buy a timeshare if you expect you'll stay there at least every second year. By that rule Hawaii isn't right for us... though a place like Lake Tahoe might be. We can drive to it, and it's a great jumping-off point for abundant outdoors activities we enjoy.

5) Do you want to stay for a week at a time? Even if everything else is right you need to consider whether staying in a place for a week at a time matches your vacation style. For many people, possibly even most people, it does. For us, though, it's a tough fit. Our vacation style is almost always to hop around. We love seeing different things when we travel and often only stay in one place for a day or two. If we stay in one place for 4-5 days that's a lot for us. That's a big reason why a timeshare remains a tough sell for us, even if we see one selling for pennies on the dollar.


canyonwalker: My other car is a pair of hiking boots (in beauty I walk)
Bassets, Calif - Sat, 25 Sep 2021, 11am

The first day of our weekend trip to the Sierra Nevada began when I awoke to my usual Saturday alarm at 8am. Well, so much for getting an early start on the day, as I hoped when we arrived before 11pm last night. But hey, being able to sleep in a bit was the main reason we stretched the driving (and the hotel cost) to stay here, instead of somewhere an hour closer to home, last night. We did at least get rolling before 9am.

The Hampton Inn, Truckee, near Lake Tahoe (Sep 2021)

I titled last night's blog "Over the Mountain and Through the Woods" because this hotel is in a nice, wooded area on the outskirts of Truckee. I couldn't convey the nice setting in a picture taken at 11pm, so here's one from just before 9 this morning. With such a nice hotel it's a shame most of our time in it is a) in the dark and b) unconscious. 😜

Just north of Truckee along CA-89 is a picnic site whose name always gives me a chuckle.

At the Donner Picnic Area you BETTER bring enough for everyone! (Sep 2021)

The Donner Party made history in California in the 1800s for getting stuck in a blizzard near this area and resorting to cannibalism to survive. At this picnic area you better bring enough food to share with everyone— or else!

After a brief stop for that photo we continued north on CA-89 to the small town of Sierraville in a picturesque high valley, then west on CA-49 past the tiny, tiny town of Satterly (pop. 47!) to Bassets, where we turned north on the Gold Lakes Highway. Along the drive we started to fret about the amount of smoke visible in the air. AQI measures I'd watched over the past 2 weeks suggested that the smoke was basically gone. Apparently it's merely not a big factor at ground level but it's still up in the air graying out long distance views.

The Sierra Buttes rock formation rises to over 8,500 ft. elev. (Sep 2021)

Just above Bassets is a roadside pull-out that offers a great view of the Sierra Buttes. These volcanic spires rise to over 8,500' elevation. Smoke interfered with our view. I've cleaned most of it out of this picture... so let's just say this is one of those cases where the reality doesn't do the picture justice. 😔 OTOH at least it's not as smoky as the last time we were here, in 2018. That blog (linked) shows what it's like when the smoke is pretty bad... and also what it's like when the air is clear.

We're headed to the fire lookout atop Sierra Buttes (Sep 2021)

Our first hike today will be to the top of the Sierra Buttes. Atop the tallest spire is a fire lookout station. You can just make it out atop the ridge in the telephoto picture above. In particular that is what we'll climb to.

The adventure continues! Keep reading in Hike Sierra Buttes? Nah, Let's Drive!


canyonwalker: wiseguy (Default)
This weekend is our anniversary. Hawk and I have been together for 27 years, officially married for 15 of them. We're celebrating with a quick weekend trip. Tonight we'll drive up to Truckee, California.

"WTF is Truckee?" you might ask. "Do you drive there in your caree on the roadee?" Well, the town's name is derived from that of a  native Paiute chief and spelled phonetically in frontier English. It has nothing to do with trucks. But more to the point, Truckee is a town just over the crest of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. It's an excellent jumping-off point to Lake Tahoe to the south and the Gold Lakes Basin to the north. We'll spend the weekend hiking out there.

This trip also has a special relevance to the occasion. We were hiking in the Gold Lakes Basin when we decided to get married, and we were staying in Truckee that weekend. This weekend we'll even stay at the same hotel!
canyonwalker: Sullivan, a male golden eagle at UC Davis Raptor Center (Golden Eagle)
As I've been surfing through news about the Caldor Fire forcing evacuations around Lake Tahoe (link to previous blog) a few photos have really stuck with me. One's this one, of Emerald Bay:

Emerald Bay, Lake Tahoe, in the smoke (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli)
AP Photo / Rich Pedroncelli

The picture is from a few days ago, before the mandatory evacuation order came down. Note the fires are not at Lake Tahoe. Even today they're still a few miles away from the lake, and days ago they were further out, but they are still sending considerable smoke over the area.

Here's an example of what Emerald Bay on Lake Tahoe looks like normally:

Emerald Bay at Lake Tahoe

This picture (above) is from a hiking trip to Eagle Falls in June 2019.

The picture below is from a hike up to Granite Lake in August 2019:

Looking out over Emerald Bay, Lake Tahoe, and the mountains from the Desolation Wildneress

(Why 2019 pics and none from 2020? Coronavirus, yo! Lake Tahoe was even closed to visitors at times last year.)


canyonwalker: Sullivan, a male golden eagle at UC Davis Raptor Center (Golden Eagle)
Fires are burning all over the west, smoke is everywhere even 2,000 miles away, yadda yadda yadda. Stories about wildfires burning in California, Oregon, Washington, and Idaho (and other states) have become such a fixture in the news feed that it's easy to tune them out. Thus my ear perked up this morning when I heard that evacuation had been ordered for South Lake Tahoe.

Part of why news of the fires has faded into the background noise of the daily news is that the fires have been burning mostly in wilderness and sparsely populated areas. And hooray for that! We don't need a repeat of the tragedy when 2018's Camp Fire killed 85 people when it swept through Paradise, California.

South Lake Tahoe is a town of 20,000 residents plus many tourists. By midday today the fire had already swept through many cabin/vacation home areas in the mountains west of the area and had approached to within 7 miles of town. Authorities ordered evacuation of South Lake Tahoe and many adjacent communities.

News reports showed long lines of vehicles on the roads, with drivers waiting for hours to get out of town. That's because there was just one exit route left. US-50 west of South Lake Tahoe has been closed for a while now as fires have crossed it, and authorities closed California 89 to the north today (AFAICT). That left only US-50 east into Nevada.

Thankfully with authorities focused on getting everyone out the traffic jams cleared up by late this afternoon. Sometimes evacuation orders can see a bit aggressive. In the past there have always been residents who're like, "Naw, man, I'll stay here." After what happened in Paradise a few years ago— when the evacuation order came too late and people burned alive stuck in traffic jams trying to flee— more people are cautious now.

Update: pictures of Lake Tahoe in the smoke vs. not (next blog)

canyonwalker: My other car is a pair of hiking boots (in beauty I walk)
Eldorado National Forest, California
Friday, 16 Jul 2021. 6:30pm.

Our plan for today has been to hike another trail or two in the Crystal basin after hiking Bassi Falls then camp for the night nearer to Wright's Lake to hike into the Desolation Wilderness tomorrow. Our visit to Bassi falls took longer than expected— a few hours and 3 blogs. Our next hike took longer than expected, too. It also took a lot out of me. Thus now we're headed off to find a campsite.

The hike we just completed was a trek to the top of Bunker Hill, where there's a historic stone fire lookout. Most of the ascent to the peak's 7.524' summit was handled by our car. We tried visiting this peak on a trip to the Crystal Basin 4 years ago the road was closed a few miles away. This time the dirt 4x4 trails were in good condition, though there was still a locked gate about a mile below the summit, presumably to deter damage to the fire lookout.

"It's just a mile each way, how hard can it be?" you might ask.

Well, it was hard. The last mile entailed over 600' of ascent, at altitudes I wasn't acclimated to. Multiple times on the trip I considered turning around. Multiple times I had to "go back to the well" to summon new reserves of energy to continue on. I made it.

Historic fire lookout atop Bunker Hill, Eldorado National Forest, California (Jul 2021)
A historic fire lookout sits perched at 7,524' atop Bunker Hill. A ranger told us it is the highest stone tower still standing.

The 360° views from atop this peak are amazing. To the west there is nothing topping this elevation for thousands of miles. I might have thought to see if I could see the Pacific Ocean from here (200 miles away) but I was too tired to remember. Instead Hawk and I both admired the view to the east, where the granite peaks of the Crystal Range, about 15 miles away, are easily in view.

From the fire lookout we see Wrights Lake, the Crystal Range, and... A FIRE! (Jul 2021)
From our vantage at the fire lookout atop Bunker Hill we can see Wright's Lake in the distance, the Crystal Range mountains beyond it, and beyond that... the smoke of a fire!

At the foot of the Crystal Range is Wright's Lake. We'll be camping near there tonight and then hiking up into the mountains tomorrow morning.

Notice that cloud on the left side of the photo. At first, from lower down the mountain, we though it was a rain cloud, possible a late-afternoon thunderstorm brewing in the high peaks of the Tahoe rim. As we gained altitude and could see more of it we noticed its too-dark color and lack of vertical shape— thunderheads reach thousands of feet above their floors. We realized it was a smoke cloud. From a wildfire. How ironic to spot the smoke of a fire from a (shuttered) fire lookout!

UPDATE: This is the Tamarack fire burning south of Lake Tahoe. At the time I wasn't sure because news I'd last read Thursday afternoon reported the Tamarack fire as relatively small and far away. This smoke cloud seemed too close. By Friday afternoon when I shot this picture, though, it had grown significantly larger. Over the weekend it exploded in size, forcing evacuations in several small towns south of Lake Tahoe.

canyonwalker: wiseguy (Default)
When something occurs frequently the phenomenon needs a name. This week I realized there needs to be a name for "news" articles that are actually just advertisements. These are the pieces in my news feed, usually several per day, with titles like "Five Unbelievable Deals at Amazon Today!" (someone's flogging their affiliate links) and "Three Secrets of Chik-Fil-A" (a transparent ad for the restaurant chain, and the research for the article consists of quoting two Reddit posts). For these fake, advertising articles I propose the term advertarticle.

ad·ver·tart·ic·le, n: an advertisement, for a product or service from a paying sponsor, purporting to be a news article.

I thought about this again yesterday when I saw an advertarticle from Lonely Planet about how Lake Tahoe is a great place for travel right now in the Coronavirus pandemic. Oh yes, there are multiple levels of stupid in that.
  1. The advertarticle was transparently a ploy to drive people to bookings sites for air travel, hotels, and vacation rentals— which Lonely Planet earns referral fees from.
  2. Among other things the advertarticle touted was that Lake Tahoe is a great place for summer fun right now. Uh, no it's not! It's December and very much winter right now. Temperatures at water level at Lake Tahoe's 6,224' elevation are around freezing with snow in the forecast almost every day this week.
  3. This is not only a terrible time to travel because of the Coronavirus pandemic but especially so in California (3/4 of Lake Tahoe is in California) where state public health rules nominally prohibit leisure travel right now. The advertarticle is not only mindless but irresponsible.

As if to highlight the money-grubbing absurdity of #3, news— actual news— posted later in the day that Lake Tahoe is shutting down to tourists on Friday (San Francisco Chronicle, 9 Dec 2020).


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