Ended up driving down the 395 and decided to take our time and stretch the legs of our new 4x4.
First up was Tahoe. First time driving in the snow with Big Clif and it was everything I had hoped for.
Stopped real quick in South Lake to let the pup play in the snow for the first time. Needless to say, he enjoyed it.
Continued down to Mono Lake
We drove around some of the 4x4 trails for a while, which would have been fine in 2wd since the sand seemed compact/frozen. Im sure in summer it's a different story. We parked for the night in a popular pullout.
We then hunkered down for the night. Temps were forecasted to hit low twenties, high teens so time for the espar to shine. I had only been able to test it in my driveway minimally, so i was interested to see how it went. Fired up fine and heated up the van wonderfully, but didn't seem to be kicking back on, so i decided now was the time to install the high altitude kit I had been needing to install. Nothing like on the road fixes in crunch time!
Installed it according to some sprinter forum pictures and all was well. Pretty sure i just wasn't waiting long enough, heater kicked on probably once an hour throughout the night.
Woke up early to catch the sunrise, and was greeted to a frozen windshield, on the inside! I had a window cracked to try and help with this, but apparently it wasn't enough.
Made it down to the lake only to find a half dozen cars with the same plan, no idea where they slept the night before, because no one was around us.
We packed up and took off heading south.