Watson Lake Trail Reconnaissance

       This winter we were lucky enough to receive a record 800+ inches of snowfall in Lake Tahoe. It made for an amazing ski season but it is going to drastically shorten my window of time to run the Tahoe Rim. Today I decided to at least try to run to Watson Lake and back. Watson Lake is roughly 7 miles in to the 19.2 mile segment from Brockway Summit to Tahoe City, making for a 14 mile round trip with considerable elevation gain. Aside from the occasional patch of snow the trail was mainly clear for the first 5.5 miles. Somewhere around the 6 mile mark I completely lost the trail under about 5 feet of snow and somehow ended up on an access road which I followed to Watson Lake. I arrived at Watson Lake, which sits at 7,500 ft  elevation, to find the lake still 90% frozen over and surrounded by at least 5 feet of solid snow pack. Keep in mind that it is already almost July and large portions of the TRT are over 9,000 ft with several spots over 10,000 ft. Needless to say its going to be a few more weeks before I can really start.