Ok, We Took a Day Off Anyway - But we had a Client with Us!

Rainbow Trout and Eggs for Breakfast - Courtesy of Blue Lakes, Alpine County, California.

(LAKE TAHOE REAL ESTATE BLOG) We broke down and took a necessary day off on the Sunday before Memorial Day. To do so, though, we took a client with us. That made it a much more meaningful, guilt-free day away from our real estate practice. (See the post below about how hard it is for us to do this.)

One of the many nice things about our Lake Tahoe lifestyle is trout fishing on the Blue Lakes in Alpine County, California. Here’s what I know about Blue Lakes, which came off a website from somebody who is a fisherman.

“Blue Lakes consists of Upper and Lower Blue lakes, which are connected by a small stream. Located at 8200 feet, these lakes feature a variety of trout, including brookies, rainbows and Lahontan cutthroats. The Lower Lake is planted annually with approximately 5600 pounds of catchable rainbows and 5000 brook trout fingerlings, according to Ron Hunerlach of the American River Fish Hatchery in Rancho Cordova. Upper Blue, the deeper and better lake for fishing, is planted with 4800 catchable rainbows and 10,000 Lahontan cutthroat fingerlings each year. Just above Upper Blue is Twin Lake, which is planted with 3,000 brook trout and 6,000 cutthroat. Both lakes, managed by PG&E, offer great bank fishing access and camping facilities, since a good gravel road extends along the east shoreline of both lakes. Access from the road to the water is easy, with good trails going down to the shoreline." (check out Dan Bacher’s story)

What’s exciting to me about Blue Lakes is it’s gorgeous. Breathtaking. Most things around Lake Tahoe are. It’s also not very far from where we live on Lake Tahoe’s South Shore, only about a short drive through stunning mountain, meadow and snow peak views. There’s a running trout stream along the road from time to time that’s fun to look at listen to too.

Blue Lakes is also particularly tranquil, relaxing. One can feel the elevation here; it’s something easier to breathe than describe. There’s the occasional Bald Eagle here too, often perched at the towering tree tops overlooking the Lakes. I like to think I can hear their wings flap, but that’s only because this high elevation mountain calm coaxes you gently into peaceful fantasy. It’s so nice to get away from it all.

Probably even better for me about Blue Lakes is what’s not here. The cell phone does not work. I can’t connect my laptop work-station to a satellite here. There’s no TV, cable news, stock market or business reports, or anything about the mess in Iraq to be had. Blue Lakes really is time off to drift away like we did the other day.

I am not a fisherman, but my brother and business partner Gary is. So’s my wife Maxene, and so’s our client Skip. Our chocolate lab, Spanky, thinks he’s a fisherman too, but we know better. If he ever met a trout, the fish would immediately be Spanky’s best friend, and somebody else to hustle for food of any sort, and then attention after that.

Our friend and client Skip has real fishing experience too. Today though, he found his spot in the front of Gary’s small, I-got-it-special-for-Blue-Lake fishing boat and fell asleep. It didn’t take long for Skip to become calmer than the water below him. And for this entire day off, we didn’t talk about his house that we have listed in The Tahoe Keys at all.

I did catch a fish recently, but it was a King Salmon when we went to Alaska two years ago. Mostly I like  to watch, which means sitting along the water’s edge, lost in thought and waiting for already caught fish to come.

Because Gary is not just somebody who likes to fish, but a real fisherman, over the years he has mastered the art of rapid rainbow trout fishing on Blue Lakes. Usually he gets his limit in about a half hour, which leaves a lot more time for high altitude contemplation than actual fishing. Out of that space between actually fishing and not fishing, I guess, came a line from one of my favorite songs that Gary wrote, “Nothing spoke but the wake of the boat, I was happy just to be.” 

For some time now, Gary’s trout catching proficiency has somewhat led us to think of Blue Lakes as our therapeutic, spirit cleansing fish market for free. Gary always gets every trout the fish and game folks allows us to catch. Our favorite thing to do with them after that is have them for breakfast. Fresh Trout, Eggs and Diced Potatoes. The feast is so good, it too should be commemorated by a grateful song. I think sometime ago, the Washoe Indians, who used these majestic alpine lakes as their summer camping grounds, must have done actually that, with drums, chants and spiritual native magnificence. Perhaps it is this spirit that lingers, we feel, around Blue Lakes to this day.

I have always been far more of a cook than a fisherman. But not this time, though. Blue Lakes just opened for the season the day before we got there, and all the trout it seems were too sluggish, or too smart, to be lured. Gary could have changed bait, technique and caught them off the bottom, he says, but that’s not the proper way to catch Blue Lake trout. Like no real hunter will shoot game birds off a fence line, there’s a right way and a wrong way to to respect fish and game. The ritual of fair play is far more important than the catch.

So this day off on Blue Lakes was trout-free, but all the other Blue Lake wonderments were in plenitude. I watched Gary and Skip troll around in the boat long enough to be mind-free rejuvenated. Skip occasionally opened his eyes. Maxene sat next to me; she’s the kindest and most generous person I have ever known, but here at Blue Lakes on this awesome day, taking it all in quietly together, we communicated perfectly across silent moments without saying a word. Spanky, tired from swimming, and then shivering, sat beside us in the warming sun on his own, focused quest for cheddar cheese popcorn. It appears the spirit of the Washoe had escaped him.

So there we are, a day off, with family, a friend, our two labrador retrievers and one Bald Eagle. Trout and eggs would have to wait... until the next time.

So what does this have to do with real estate?, one might ask the question. Everything! Just ask us, or our client Skip. Better yet, let us take you out to Blue Lakes and we can answer the question for you... without saying a word.