Cycling with you to the summit!

SIGN UP

SHARE WITH FRIENDS

Facebook

Twitter

Other

Lake Tahoe - Top Bike Climbs

Mt. Rose East

USA, NV

Monitor Pass East

USA, CA

Monitor Pass West

USA, CA

Kingsbury Grade - East

USA, NV

Ebbetts Pass East

USA, CA

Mt. Rose West

USA, NV

Carson Pass East

USA, CA

Ebbetts Pass West

USA, CA

#10

Luther Pass East

USA, CA

#11

Wrights Lake Road

USA, CA

ALL CLIMBS

PJAMM TRIPS

MEMBER COMMENTS

Cycling around Lake Tahoe is an exceptional experience, although you will almost always encounter a fair amount of traffic along the way. We recommend the clockwise route (that puts you closest to the lake during the ride) and starting at sunrise on a Sunday during the summer. The Top 10 Lake Tahoe road bike climbs are, in order of difficulty: 1. Mt. Rose East, 2. Monitor Pass East, 3. Monitor Pass West , 4. Kingsbury Grade - East, 5. Ebbetts Pass East, 6. Mt. Rose West , 7. Carson Pass East, 8. Spooner Summit , 9. Ebbetts Pass West, and 10. Luther Pass East

The best, hardest, most scenic, and epic road bike climbs around and near Lake Tahoe can be viewed on this page via the map (zoom in to view climbs in particular areas), by Climb Cards (photo and stats) or by a detailed list of the climbs that can be arranged in metric or imperial units by difficulty, distance (longest climbs in the area), altitude gained, highest elevation (highest summit), average grade (sort the grades by varying distances), lowest start point, etc. Click on "Climb Page" to jump to the detail page for that particular bike climb. This page provides an excellent and comprehensive summary of the top, hardest and best bicycling climbs in the Lake Tahoe area.

See also our Bike Ride Around Lake Tahoe page.

Our PJAMM Tahoe Preloaded Trip Page are at the bottom of this page or accessed by clicking the PJAMM Trips purple button above.

Climb List: Lake Tahoe
(sort by distance, difficulty, elevation and more)

View:

Statistics: View Tutorial

Total Climbs: 19

Top 100 USA: 19

Avg. PDI (Top 5): 18.9

Sort By Attribute:

Display:

Showing All 19 Climbs

Measurement System

USA Rank

PDI

1 - 25

26 - 50

51 - 75

76 - 100

over 100

Gravel

Style

Climb

Location

Climb Info

SHERPA MAP ELEVATE YOUR ROUTE PLANNING

We've partnered with Sherpa-Map.com to bring you the best route planning tool. With Sherpa Map you can plan your route up a PJAMM climb or use their route generator and custom map styles to plot your next big ride.

VISIT SHERPA MAP

PJAMM TRIPS ADVENTURE STARTER BUNDLES

Check out PJAMM Adventure's prepackaged (self-guided) cycling trips. They will help you plan, document and conquer your next adventure.

ALL TRIPS

Browse all of our prepackaged trips and find your next adventure!

Death Ride (Tour of the California Alps)

United States (CA)

7 ROUTES

19 POIs

ROUTE STATS (TOTAL)

104.2

DISTANCE

14,111

ELEV. GAIN

Lake Tahoe

United States (CA,NV)

18 ROUTES

32 POIs

ROUTE STATS (TOTAL)

245.7

DISTANCE

35,240

ELEV. GAIN

MEMBER COMMENTS

Already have an account?

Rainbow bridge near Donner Summit - Donner Lake in background.

THE HARDEST BIKE CLIMB IN THE LAKE TAHOE AREA

MT. ROSE EAST

Ride 16.7 miles gaining 4,350’ to 8,900’ at 5% average grade.

This is a rugged ride to altitude beginning off Hwy 395 just south of Reno. Traffic for the first half of the climb is brutal. We recommend doing this climb as an over-and-back from Incline Village (starting on Mt. Rose West), and riding down Mt. Rose East only to Galena Creek Visitor Center (6.8 miles short of the start). The climb from the Visitor Center to Mt. Rose Summit is a challenging 10 miles at 5.4% with less traffic than starting at Hwy 395. Regardless, this is a major route from Reno to Lake Tahoe, so you will encounter many trucks along the way, but there is a good bike lane the entire route.

THE SECOND HARDEST BIKE CLIMB IN THE LAKE TAHOE AREA

MONITOR PASS EAST

Cycling Monitor Pass East - aerial drone photo of long straight stretch of road looking west from the pass

Cycling Monitor Pass, home of the Death Ride - an epic Sierra Nevada bike climb.

Photo - Aerial view west from location directly above Monitor Pass markers.

California Top 10 Most Epic Climb

From Markleeville, ride up and over Monitor Pass West then down to Hwy 395, turn around and come up this epic bike climb. The start of Monitor East is the outer boundary of our Lake Tahoe Climb area - it is 54 miles from South Lake Tahoe - 108 miles and 12,200’ of climbing to do the South Lake Tahoe to Monitor East and back route. Monitor East is the backbone of Alpine County’s annual Death Ride.

THE MOST SCENIC BIKE CLIMB IN THE LAKE TAHOE AREA

DONNER SUMMIT

Cycling Donner Summit (Donner Pass).

Scenic Hwy 40 is bottom center of photo and Donner Lake top center.

Railway right center; Hwy 80 upper left.

Start this ride at the western edge of Donner Lake and ride a gorgeous 3.2 miles to the high point of Scenic (it is!) Route 40, just past the spectacular Rainbow Bridge.

The iconic Donner Summit (Rainbow) Bridge - top right/bottom left.

WOW! This is an iconic and gorgeous climb out of Donner Lake near Lake Tahoe, California. We begin in a cool and sweet smelling alpine setting at the western end of Donner Lake by riding up (you’ll know!) Donner Pass Road from its intersection with South Shore Drive. This is one of the California 10 Most Scenic Bike Climbs.

The climb is on . . . you guessed it . . . Scenic Rte 40

RIDE AROUND LAKE TAHOE AREA

Ride 74 miles gaining 4,065’.

I have ridden around Lake Tahoe 3 times - all in the winter (one of the only advantages of 10 years of drought in California). The winder ride is spectacular and with much less traffic (I am told) than riding during the winter. I prefer riding clockwise around the lake (you are on the lake side going in this direction).