It was not intended to be an inclement weather Subie road test, but that’s what our Bay Area/Yosemite/Tahoe/Bishop trek has become. Talk about weather…wow! It’s either been rain or snow with only one day of sunshine, but it was sunshine below freezing at high altitudes on Highway 88 into Lake Tahoe. The rules said I was supposed to have tire chains or 4WD with snow tires, but hell, I’ve never been too good with rules. I’m talking slick roads with walls of snow taller than the top of my Subie Outback. We rode the ice nearly all the way. It was grand fun, and the Subaru hasn’t missed a beat. Chains? We don’t need no stinking chains!
We only ventured about 10 miles into Yosemite when discretion won out over valor. The visibility was low and the snow was high, so we called it a day and turned around. We stayed in Groveland at a grand old hotel and had dinner in the oldest bar in California (the Iron Door Grill). It used to be a sporting palace back in the day (I asked, but all the sports ladies had long since retired). The Gold Rush Highway the next day was grand even in the rain, but the ride up to Lake Tahoe was a bit on the scary side. And then the ride down the Kingsbury Grade from Tahoe down to Highway 395 was just flat terrifying…it was 20 miles per hour all the way down in a heavy snowfall. The 395 was daunting, too, with most of it in the snow. But hey, we’re here in Bishop, we’re warm, and we’re ready to continue in the morning.
Tomorrow it’s Death Valley and then home. The weather is supposed to be nice and that almost seems like a letdown after what we’ve driven through. The Subie is a star in the snow and we’re loving it.
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