In July, we had a perfect stay at Echo Lake.
We liked it so well, in fact, that we went back again the next month!

A nostalgic detour

Making our way home from our hiking trip in the Eastern Sierras, we decided to stop at Echo Lake — or, more accurately, Echo Lakes, since there are actually two lakes connected by a narrow channel. Echo Lake is located off Highway 50, near the southern end of Lake Tahoe, and at an elevation of about 7400 feet.

When he was a teenager in the late 1960s, Craig attended Harvey West Boy Scout Camp on the far shore of upper Echo Lake. Each year, the boys would spend a week by the lake and a second week backpacking into the Desolation Valley Wilderness above. For Craig, this was his introduction to the Sierras and the beginning of a lifelong love of hiking and the outdoors.

ASIDE #1: Looking at this photograph, Craig immediately noted that this had to be a staged shot. Not only did the scouts at Harvey West not wear their uniforms at camp, but they would never have worn them on a hike — especially not those ceremonial hats! These boys look like their uniforms and gear came directly from the dry cleaners. But how would we know they were boy scouts without their uniforms? And to be fair, the original caption does say that they are practicing hiking. 

ASIDE #2: This photo came from the archives of the Forest History Society, where I’m guessing it was of interest chiefly because of the tree in the left background, which the caption identifies as “a veteran western juniper believed to be well over 2000 years old.” 

A place to stay

For several years, Craig had talked about wishing that we could spend a week at Echo Lake. I had done some research into renting one of the 100+ private cabins set around the lakes, but had had no luck. Still, we figured, there had to be a way. Remembering the bulletin board at the little general store at the base of the lower lake, Craig had the idea of posting a notice there to ask about possible rentals. Maybe, we thought, we might even see notices about cabins for rent. So on our way back from the Eastern Sierra, we figured it was worth a detour up to Echo Lake to see what we could find out.

Our timing was even better than we’d hoped! While there were no “For Rent” notices on the bulletin board, we happened to make the acquaintance of Kathleen Fashinell, whose family has run the Echo Chalet for many years. The little store Craig remembered is part of their business and so, too, are a number of small, rustic cabins they call “chaletlees,” situated above the lower end of the lower lake. The chaletlees were not yet open — their season runs roughly from July 4 through Labor Day — and, as luck would have it, they had just had a cancellation for mid July. We grabbed it.

A trip and then another trip

Our reservation was for the third week of July, by which time the snow was gone and wildflowers were abundant. As promised, our chaletlee was rustic but adequate for our needs, including a small kitchen with a two-burner hot plate, a dorm-sized fridge, a bed and a bathroom. And, best of all, a wonderful deck overlooked the lake through a leafy screen of trees.

The first morning saw us up early and out for a hike along the lake. We took the water taxi to the top of the upper lake, then followed the three-mile perimeter trail back to our base. It’s a rocky but reasonably easy path, but the altitude (7400+ feet) made hiking a challenge for the first day or so, until we got acclimated.

Along with our hiking shoes, we had decided to bring paddle boards (or SUPs — stand-up paddle boards — as everyone calls them) up to the lake. We were new to SUP-ing, though I’d taken a couple of lessons here in Alameda. Undaunted by our inexperience, we rented boards to bring with us.

I can’t say that we were exactly naturals at paddling. Yes, we did fall in — quite a few times, in fact — but the water was not painfully cold and the chill motivated us to scramble back up on the boards as quickly as we could! Still, it was a lot of fun — and so beautiful out on the lake. And we got a little better over the course of the week.

An early start on the water meant minimal wind and great conditions for exploring. And once we got our SUP-legs, we managed to paddle all the way to the top of the upper lake to check out the site of Craig’s boy scout camp. Camp Harvey West hosted its last groups of campers in 1991, and very little evidence of the site now remains.

One of the camp rituals, Craig told me, was a daily, crack-of-sunrise dip in the lake. He remembers:

It always felt really cold, and the water seemed really cold. You’d gather on the beach — all the people who were gonna do it — in your bathing suit. And at the signal you had to run out into the water up to your neck and sing this song:

We are the polar bears!
We are the polar bears!
We are the best at Harvey West!
We are the polar bears!

After which everyone would run out screaming, because it was so goddam cold! You’d sing it and then run out — no strolling! 

Not everyone in the camp did it — only the stupidest or craziest or ridiculous-est! But you did it every day so you could get the Polar Bear patch. 

In case you’d like to try this for yourself, here’s the song (which should be be sung with vigor — and all possible speed!):

After a couple of days at Echo Lake, we settled into something of a routine: an early-morning SUP, a break for breakfast/lunch, a midday hike, then a nap and reading on the deck, followed by a relaxing evening of more reading or playing cards. A person could get used to this!

Once accustomed to the altitude, Craig and I decided to break our routine with a longer hike up to Lake Aloha, located in the Desolation Valley Wilderness above Echo Lakes. It’s a climb, but the views and the flowers rewarded our efforts, as did cooling our tired feet in the lake.

We took a couple other breaks from our relaxing rhythm during that week: one evening we went out to dinner in South Lake Tahoe and then checked out a magic show at one of the casinos in Stateline (the town just over the border in Nevada).

Another day we went into town for breakfast and, on impulse, called up our friends Rudy and Tony. They live in Santa Barbara but have a cabin in South Lake Tahoe — and they just happened to be in town. We spent a great afternoon and evening catching up with them, visiting the big lake and gorging ourselves on enormous ice cream cones.

We had a wonderful time during that magical week, and before leaving we booked our chaletlee for next summer. Though a little sad to be heading back to our regular routines, seven straight days of relaxation were about enough for us. And we had things to do at home, as one always does.

After a couple of weeks, though, we found ourselves longing to go back to the mountains. So we called and emailed and generally pestered Kathleen, until she let us know that there were three more nights available in mid-August. So back we went — and we look forward to visiting again next year!

• Echo Chalet
• Echo Lakes Association
• Many thanks to Eben Lehman, Director of Library and Archives at the Forest History Society in Durham, North Carolina, for providing the photograph of the hiking boy scouts! I originally found the photo on the Forest Society’s Flicker photostream.

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• Hiking in the Eastern Sierra
• Echo Lake Summer 2023