September 24

Last night was colder than the night before not because of temperature, but because of the wind. It was blowing hard and my chosen campsite was exposed and I was laying on the windward side of my tarp. Next time, I will make sure there is a buffer between myself and the wind to keep it from penetrating my sleeping bag. 

We packed everything up in the wind and climbed out over Dick's Pass to hike the 17 miles to Echo Lake. The top of the pass presented a panorama view, the likes of which, we haven't seen in quite a while. We could see lakes on both sides and a wall of granite ahead that the Desolation Wilderness is known so well to have. A few drops here and there in the morning and even a few flakes showed themselves in the morning hours. All precipitous clouds disappeared by midday and we had sunshine and steady wind for the rest of the day. We got to South Lake Tahoe via two hitches and made our way immediately to McDonald's. It was right across the street from where we were dropped off and there was no way we could resist the calorie craving and allurement of free wifi. We spent so much time absorbed in web surfing that we forgot to go to the post office before it closed to get my package, but since we planned on staying over night here it's not a big deal. I found a Chinese buffet 0.3 miles from where we were and we went there to have dinner. It was shortly after 6:00 pm when we arrived and after 8:00 when we waddled out the door. We found a casino with cheap rooms and cheap breakfast and took the bus to the state line where we hiked into our 4th state (Nevada) to stay at the casino. It feels good to have a shower and clean sheets for a night especially since the forecast is calling for snow again tonight.