Events

The season opens.

The general trout season opens on the last Saturday in April, and the fish trucks are not far behind. CDFW plants the resort's stretch of the East Fork from May through October — the plants we have on record ran every three to five weeks through the early season — and Alpine County's own trophy program adds big fish on top.

Sign up for fish-plant alerts on the Fishing page and you'll know the week the truck came, straight from the state's own postings.

The Fourth at Carson River Resort.

The Fourth is the resort's own tradition and it keeps the same shape every year: a fish weigh-in, live bands, barbecue and smoked fish, and the flags — which fly here all year — doing rather more work than usual. The America 250 summer was marked the same way.

The dates, the band line-up and the set times are settled each January and print here once they are. If you are planning a trip around the weekend before then, call (530) 694-2229.

The pavilion, where the Fourth happens →

Death Ride weekend.

The Tour of the California Alps — 103 miles, about 14,000 feet of climbing, up to six passes, roughly 95% of it on roads closed to cars — has started and finished at Turtle Rock Park, four miles up the road, since the early 1980s.

On ride morning Caltrans closes Highway 89 from Markleeville to the Highway 4 junction — the road past this gate is closed course, and the Monitor climb begins where that junction is, a few miles further south. The ride's own lodging page lists this resort and says it “is located on the Death Ride route.” The 45th ride ran July 11, 2026; the 46th is Saturday, July 10, 2027.

We keep a page on the ride — what closes and when, the weekend's shape, and how to stay on the course itself. Registration, the route, and the rulebook live with the organizers at deathride.com.

The Death Ride, from this porch →

The climb out of the valley

Markleeville Creek Day.

The community's annual watershed workday, hosted by the Alpine Watershed Group since 2001: willow stakes, creek cleanups, invasive pulls and erosion work on the creeks that feed this river.

In 2026 it runs Saturday, September 19, 9:00am to 12:30pm, meeting at Markleeville Library Park, 270 Laramie Street. RSVP with the Watershed Group so they have the headcount, bring water and closed-toe shoes, and they will hand you tools and a site leader. If you are here that weekend, join in.

Creek Day, the whole morning →

Heenan Season and the Aspen.

September 1 to November 30 is Heenan Lake season: California's Lahontan cutthroat broodstock lake, six miles up the Monitor road, catch-and-release on barbless artificials, trophy-size Lahontans of 18 to 24 inches.

The same road carries the aspen show from late September to mid-October, when whole groves — each one a single organism on a shared root system — turn gold.

Zone X-8's general deer season runs Sept. 26 to Oct. 11 on the same country, and the resort is inside the zone.

Heenan Lake, the whole picture →

The quiet season.

Monitor and Ebbetts close with the snow and the county empties out, but the road in is maintained on the Caltrans schedule and the cabins stay open all winter. What the place becomes is a base camp: guests sleep here and drive out to Kirkwood or up the Blue Lakes road to ski and to run snowmobiles. In a heavy storm you will not get anywhere past us at all. Some people book that on purpose.

Skiing and the snowmobile routes →