Truckin'

Today I needed to return my dad's bike to him in Incline Village. I installed some taller handlebars, which also required new cables to accommodate the height difference. Like all of us, my dad wants his handlebars higher as the years go by. After a quick tune-up, it was ready to go.

Jenn and I figured it was a good opportunity to ride on the bike trails in Truckee that we drove by so, so many times while we were working on the condo in Incline.

After dropping off the bike and visiting, we drove back to Truckee. By the time we started riding at 12:30 it was 84 degrees. It was hot in the sun, but the wind helped.

Truckee has a fairly substantial trail system. We started at the parking lot on 267 (red marker) and rode towards Truckee, eventually meeting the Truckee River and riding along it up to the Union Mills neighborhood. 

Towards the end is a steep climb with great views.

At the terminus, benches are provided for you to rest.

We then backtracked down the hill and along the river.

We made our way back and rode past the truck towards Northstar. We had set a two-hour time limit for the ride because of dinner commitments, so we turned around before reaching ski area. All told we rode 19.94 miles. It was a pleasant ride and certainly a lot less crowded than our Folsom trails. We will go back at some point.

Later.

The Doors

One of the renovation tasks we decided to tackle ourselves was the kitchen cabinets. Replacing cabinets is a very expensive proposition, and it requires a permit. We decided to "reface" the old cabinets instead. Here's the before picture from our old rental company.

Pretty hideous, right?

The first order of business was to remove the doors and drawers, patch the holes, and let our professional painters do their thing.

Going from dingy white to gray was an immediate improvement.

Then it was time to make a door prototype. I watched a few videos about making "budget shaker doors" and decided to use 1/2" maple plywood with a 1/4" maple border. While it came out OK, it didn't have the quality I was looking for.

I also needed to replace the drawers. The old ones were a little small for the cabinets, so I built the scrap wood prototype a little wider so there wouldn't be as much slop and play.

On the next trip to Tahoe we checked the fit and everything was perfect.

Time to go into production.

I watched a few more videos and decided to make true shaker cabinets. We would go the MDF route because it's inexpensive, easy to work with, and the doors would be painted anyway.

I took all my measurements and performed the calculations to build everything.

I purchased the components to build a fairly professional table router setup. It was expensive, but very much worth it.

This allows you to route all the rails and styles with precision.

Unfortunately my trusty old Craftsman table saw bit the dust during this project.

It was replaced with this DeWalt portable unit that turned out to be so vastly superior that I should have bought one years ago.

Assembly went pretty quickly and soon we had a bunch of doors and drawer fronts.

Each one had to be painstakingly sanded to smooth out the seams and round all the sharp corners.

Then it was off to paint, a task that Jennifer handled. She learned quickly and did a great job.

She pre-sprayed all the drawer parts so when I tacked them together, they were mostly painted.

Everything went up pretty easily and lined up well.

I made one calculation mistake thinking I would use 1.5 inch overlay hinges everywhere. It turned out that a few doors needed 3/4" hinges. No big deal, I was able to cut down the offending doors and replace one rail without too much effort.

Installing the drawer fronts was easily the most difficult part. Getting them level and lined up with both each other and the cabinet doors proved tricky.

All that was left was installing the black hardware. It was a piece of cake with the jig I bought.

In the end we were pretty happy with the finished product.

Were they perfect? No. But we learned a lot and next time we will edge much closer to the perfection we always seek with home improvement projects.

Later.

The Wall

After recently finishing the remodel of the Tahoe condo, I thought I would highlight some of the cooler improvements we made.

The bar area was pretty terrible: Tile countertop, hideous gray and pink tile on the wall, and a high bar level which closed off the room a bit.

We tore out all the tile and I cut down the wall.

I installed sheetrock so I had something to glue the wall treatment to.

Unfortunately we didn't quite have enough wall panel. Back to Floor and Decor.

In the end it turned out great. I will definitely use this stuff again for a feature wall.

Later.

Moving On

I was born and raised in the Sacramento area, and I am still here today, but for most of my adult life my emotional home has been in Incline Village, Nevada. Home is where the heart is. And right now my heart is aching just a little.

I could make a case for Incline Village being the greatest place on earth for a cyclist to have a home base. Obviously that's a bold statement, but greatness is personal and subjective. For me, the combination of riding opportunities, scenery and vibe is second to none.

View from the Rim Trail: Marlette Lake foreground, Lake Tahoe background.

My introduction to the area was the Great Flume Race in 1985. It was my first race at elevation and it killed me, but the riding was incredible. The Flume Trail was unlike anything I had experienced to that point. It sparked something inside me.

Anyone have some oxygen?

Shortly after that race—in a completely unrelated move—my dad, uncle and four friends chipped in and bought a condo together in nearby Incline Village. I now had an opportunity to explore the area. And it was so, so good. I vowed that one day I would own my own place in Incline.

For years it would be our home base for rides and Tahoe-area races. Good times.

I have so many blurry selfies from film camera days . . .

When Jennifer and I met we began going up there together.

The year 2000 or so on the first of many bikes I would build for her.

Happy guy.

Fast forward to 2011. The country was in the middle of a mortgage crisis, and we saw the opportunity to achieve my dream. We made an offer on a foreclosure property in Incline and got it. You can read about that here if you care. It's not lost on me how lucky we are. The situation was terrible for so many families who lost their homes, and that crisis is the only reason we could pull this off.

At first the condo ownership was great. We spent a lot of time up there, and I was living my dream. Paying a second mortgage was tough at times, but we offset it a little bit by renting it out to friends and acquaintances.

A couple years later in 2013, a couple things changed. One, we were finding it difficult to find time to go to Tahoe due to all the sports.

Basketball, February 2013.

Baseball, June 2013

Cross Country, September 2013

Baseball, October 2013

I have zero regrets about the sports. Our baseball journey with my son is one of the highlights of my life, and I wouldn't trade it for anything.

The other change that happened that year was our HOA outlawing vacation rentals. This killed our meager revenue stream. In October 2013, unable to use it much and with no ability to make part-time income, we decided to rent the condo full-time. It has been rented out full-time ever since, but that era comes to a close in a few weeks.

A few years ago, our original plan was to start using the condo for ourselves again, with a target date right around now. I can't begin to express how excited I was for this to happen. Then the fires came.

The Caldor Fire came perilously close to Lake Tahoe, and it was only a shift in winds that saved South Lake Tahoe.

Lake Tahoe faced a new reality. Up to that point no fire had crossed the peak of the Sierras. The relative safety we thought the bowl of Lake Tahoe provided had been shattered.

More fires came in the years since. They were larger. They burned hotter. They burned faster. We were mostly powerless to stop them. Many people still do not believe in climate change. But you know who does? Insurance actuaries.

Three years later the Tahoe Basin is suffering from an insurance crisis. Premiums are skyrocketing and for condo owners, HOA fees are doing the same. My insurance went up 43% and my HOA only 37% because I was one of the lucky ones. My HOA is now $604 a month, but other area HOAs are well over $900.

This situation is eerily similar to the one we fled in Shingle Springs. By moving to Folsom we saved about $6000 a year for homeowners insurance, and that was a couple years ago. We have friends and neighbors who are now paying in excess of $10k per year and will have difficulty selling their properties if something doesn't change.

For these reasons we feel like it would be best to get out of the Tahoe market while we can. Our tenants vacate at the end of the month, and on March 1 we will start the renovation process with the goal of getting the condo on the market as quickly as possible.

It's a painful decision, but the right one. Our hope is to find another place with the same kind of magic Incline Village provided for so many years.

Later.

Day Tripper

Today we went to Tahoe for the day to do a little riding and have lunch with my folks. I picked out Sugar Pine Point State Park on Highway 89 as our starting point. We have a Golden Poppy day pass, and this was one of the state parks we can visit for free.

We first rode north to Tahoe City. The West Shore Trail meanders through the woods and sometimes along the lake. Unfortunately it crosses the highway four times, which can be a nuisance. For the most part drivers were courteous and stopped for us at the crossings.

The main reason we like bike trails is having the ability to relax and focus on riding and not worrying about cars. This trail does a reasonable job at that, but there are numerous side street crossings and even a few places where the trail stops and you use residential streets to connect to the next trail section.

Any time the trail passed near a pine tree, there was a good chance we would hit root bumps. There were hundreds of them. Because trees also make shade, sometimes they were hard to see as you exited the bright sunlight. Even with our fat three-inch tires it was a bumpy ride at times.

When we hit Tahoe City we turned west and rode on the Truckee River Bike Path for a bit. The river is running high and clear, which is nice to see.

We were running a bit late due to Highway 50 construction on our way up, so we turned around at the 12.5 mile mark.

The water is as high as I can remember.

In places it is lapping right up to the trail.

Currently the lake is just under (6228.94) the 6229 flood pool level, which is the maximum they allow for flood protection. 

We finished up with a little over 25 miles on the day.

After cleaning up and changing into fresh clothes, we drove to Incline Village where we enjoyed a late outdoor lunch with my dad and stepmom.

The drive home on Highway 80 was a long one due to construction that narrowed the highway down to one lane. Well, technically zero lanes since we drove on the shoulder for quite a while. This added almost an hour to the drive home.

Except for the driving it was a nice day, and I already want to go back and explore the area more when we don't have time constraints.

Later.