El Dorado County

The county in brief

A traveler's read on El Dorado County

Coloma in El Dorado County is the site where James Marshall discovered gold in the American River tailrace on January 24, 1848 — the discovery that triggered the California Gold Rush of 1849 and brought 300,000 immigrants to California within five years (US Census 1850→1860 jumped from 92,597 to 379,994 statewide). The county now spans 1,707 sq mi from the Sacramento Valley floor at 200 ft up over the Crystal Range to the Sierra Nevada crest at 10,881 ft on Pyramid Peak — one of the steepest single-county elevation gradients in California. South Lake Tahoe sits on the eastern county line at 6,237 ft, the most-visited destination on Lake Tahoe's California shore; the city's 2018 Vacation Home Rental ordinance (Title 18.18 SLT Municipal Code) restricts overnight RV street parking November-April when residential snow ordinances activate, and enforces a 5-day max stay for self-contained rigs in commercial parking lots that opt in.

Eldorado NF dispersed-camping corridors at Wrights Lake (7,000 ft, road open mid-June to October) and Loon Lake (6,400 ft, Crystal Basin corridor) accept rigs to 35 ft with bear-canister food-storage orders active May-October per Forest Order R5-ENF-2019-01. US-50 from Placerville to South Lake Tahoe carries 12,400 vehicles/day per Caltrans 2023 AADT data and is the only year-round paved south-shore Tahoe access from the Central Valley; chains required December-April above 6,000 ft. Marshall Gold Discovery State Historic Park in Coloma is the only California SP unit with a working replica sawmill on the original discovery site, with first-come RV parking for day-use rigs to 40 ft.