Five Countries Four Marlboroughs: Sacramento, GOLD! and Lake Tahoe

Yesterday we left San Francisco and had to be on the tour bus by 8am. We had a few hours of driving and called into the Sacramento State Capitol building for a quick look around. Our tour guide - i think she may be warming to me after my shock checkin for the tour - allows for lots of breaks along the way which is good. Little James is getting pretty tired, when I woke him this morning he was upset, “I was having the best sleep of my life” I told him this is how i felt every weekend when he wakes me up! When he got on the bus he curled up in my lap and slept the whole time to Sacramento. Bless, or is that bliss?

We called into the Golden Nugget Market to choose some things for a picnic lunch. There was an amazing variety of food - fruit, veg, cheese, meats, sandwiches, groceries - I could have stayed there for an hour.

We then headed to the Marshell Gold Discovery State Park to pan for gold. Will and James were the first to start and the last to leave. They found some (very) little specks of gold and some garnets. James said to me, ‘Mum, one day when I’m an adult I am going to bring you back here so we can do this again” The rest of the tour had stopped panning and were eating their picnic lunch - Terry, the kids and I decided to take a walk around - no time to rest! We found the most beautiful spot where families were camping and rafting down the river. Then back on the bus for the drive to Lake Tahoe.

An hour into this part of the trip it just dawned on me that i had left the electrical adapter in the room at the hotel in SF. Oh no - how was i going to charge our electrical gear? I started to panic - my main concern was how was i going to charge the camera battery, secondly, how was i going to straighten my hair! (hehe) There was another Aussie couple on the tour, maybe they would lend me theirs once in a while?

We are loving the tour so far - such a relief as I was a bit worried at the start. The beauty of the tour bus is: neither Terry or I aren't driving so we can spend the time with the kids. Normally I’m telling them to quieten down and stop fooling but here we can look out the windows together. Terry had a bit of a snooze on the bus - something he couldn’t normally do if he was driving. I really wanted to have a little snooze too but didn’t want to miss a thing! I’ll most likely never see this again and it is just so spectacular. Another good thing about the tour is often the driver takes our bags to the hotel while we are doing an activity so when we turn up at the hotel for the night they are already in the room - no lifting!

We arrived at South Lake Tahoe and went down to the lake to take photos and check it out, then whisked off for a gondola ride. Up and up and up the mountain we went and the view of the area was getting better and bigger as we went. Words can't describe how breathtaking it was.

The hotel was really nice, in a top spot, but no time to rest....we had taken the dinner cruise option for the night - it was a drinks and dinner on the Dixie Belle paddlesteamer for a cruise around Lake Tahoe.

Well needless to say the cruise was amazing - the food pretty average but really we were only there for the view. The water was a deep cobalt blue. The funniest thing Terry had said a few hours earlier that there was this American guy on the tour with a mustache that just wouldn’t crack a smile or even acknowledge him when he spoke to him. Anyway, the funny bit was that when we were all seated at the table for dinner (tables of 6) our family was seated next to mustache guy and his wife! I took a big drink of my champers and wondered how this was going to go......

I kicked Terry under the table to get his attention, there was no need to - he looking at me in a state of panic touched with disbelief. Terry tried to start the conversation (again). Was going politely ok - the guys wife - i think Mary-Lou? was really friendly. Then we ordered our meal and he asked for A1 sauce. He asked us if we’d tried his prized favourite sauce to which we said no - so I asked the waiter to have some sauce on the side for both Terry and i to try. Well, that was it - he said he was so happy we were trying his sauce and before we knew it, it was like we were long lost mates. Things were looking up for a better night! It turns out he was a preacher - after a while he gave me a copy of the book he had written - I turned the first page (to be polite) and it said, 'we are all sinners'. Hmmmm. Sweet Mary-Lou the preacher's wife was telling us how she always carries a gun. I asked her why? She said, 'Oh just in case anyone tries to attack me, I'll just go ahead and shoot them. Hmmmm.

We arrived back at the hotel at 9:30pm - a huge day and ready for bed. We only have one night here and wish we were staying a week.