Plein air painting at Eagle Lake

The Tahoe area always manages to get me inspired to paint outdoors and I love finding new spots.  I had not hiked up to Eagle Lake since my kids were young (20+ years :\) so it was about time to check this trail out again. It's only about a mile to the lake but it's all uphill. With only a backpack, I took my bare essentials for painting: a pencil for sketching, brushes, my travel palette (with my most used paints), a sheet of 11x14 watercolor paper folded in half to fit in my backpack, and a piece of cardboard to hold the paper firm since I was not taking the whole pad.
I went "early", getting to the trailhead by 8:00am, before the parking lot was full. I had the trail almost all to myself, and saw only a handful of people once I got to the lake. I worked my way around the lake till I found a rock with a good vantage point of the lake and surrounding mountains. Plein air is always a little easier when there aren't onlookers and it seemed like I had the whole lake to myself.
I like using the water from where I'm painting instead of using my drinking water, but I have to be careful there isn't too much sediment in the water. The last time I was painting at Lake Tahoe (Regan Beach) there was so much organic matter in my wash bucket, I thought it was going to give my whole painting a green tint!
On my way back down the mountain, I knew why I had chosen to get an early start. Tons of people were on the trail now and the parking lot was completely full, with cars waiting to take my spot as I pulled out.
Overall I like it for a plein air painting but I need to work on the reflection a little more. There is only so long you can sit on a rock!