The Ritz-Carlton, Lake Tahoe

It’s just an accident of history that the great Tahoe ski boom took place during a sort of dark age for hotels — by the Fifties and Sixties they just weren’t building grand hotels the way they used to. But with the advent of the Ritz-Carlton, Lake Tahoe, there’s a case to be made that this Northern California mountain enclave is finally getting the luxury resorts it deserves.

The precise location is Northstar at Tahoe, one of several ski resorts in the Lake Tahoe area, situated along the convenient northern approach. The Northstar village is a new development, complete with outdoor skating rink, and in this context the Ritz-Carlton’s sparkling newness — it’s the first new-build hotel project in Tahoe for quite some time — feels perfectly natural.

It’s also the most luxurious hotel in town, by some distance. The lodge comprises some 170 rooms and suites, plus a few dozen residential units on top of that. And the look is perhaps refreshingly urbane. After a long drive (or a short flight) through the Sierra Nevada you’ve seen plenty of Alpine forest, and you don’t need raw timber and deer-antler chandeliers to remind you where you are. That’s what those picture windows are for.

Several restaurants serve fare in the current Northern California style — as local, seasonal and organic as possible. The spa is arguably worth the trek all by itself, and summer visitors have priority access to the Jack Nicklaus–designed Old Greenwood golf course. Bottom line: Aspen- or Vail-style luxury has finally arrived on Tahoe’s shores — and we can safely predict you’ll like it, if that’s the sort of thing you like.

How to get there:

The Ritz-Carlton, Lake Tahoe is 2 hours’ drive from Sacramento, 4 hours from San Francisco, and 20 minutes from Truckee-Tahoe Airport (TRK).