Lake Powell

[JBehrens]

You need to clamp the lines but another often overlooked but very important step is to make sure the buckets are in the full forward position. I think this is the default when not running on a 255XD but I could be wrong. You want the water to be able to move freely through the pump and not build pressure in the cooling lines.

So at Antelope you pull into the dry boat yard to the right just past the NPS gate, there you get in line/check in at the valet office. After you check in you get into your boat and someone will get in your truck and start driving the trailer. You drive your boat, they drive the truck. There is no dock at the business ramp so once you are off the trailer and give the thumbs up to the driver your truck is taken to parking for the week.

Having not personally assessed Wahweap's, I can't say what condition it might be in but I know it's now too shallow for houseboat launch and NPS wants you to have a truck with 4WD to go on the ramp. I think there are a few who have gotten stuck due to mud on the ramp. Things at Wahweap seem to change every few days but still have not effected the average boater, there are about 60/50ft left on the extensions. If you launch there, while you make the trip to Antelope (about 30min by boat), have someone take your truck over and you should arrive about the same time.

 

[FSH 210 Sport]

@RobbieO

Just returned from a one week houseboat trip to LP. I know you said you didn’t want to do a houseboat type of trip, but after being there I can’t imagine any other way to spend a week at LP with the size group we had. In the future I plan on going there by myself and camping off of my boat.

We rented a 59’ Discovery XL out of Bullfrog. The boat served our group of 9 people and two dogs very well. One of the main things is keeping food items and beverages cold, this house boat has a residential fridge / freezer as well as a 5 cuft chest freezer out on the fore deck. These two cold boxes run off of an inverter that is fed from a large battery bank. We used the chest freezer to keep frozen items frozen, and each day we would freeze a flat of water bottles to put in ice chests. There is a 14KW gen set on board that we ran twice a day to recharge the batteries. The house boat also has AC which requires the gen set to be run. The gen set was super quiet and super efficient, we used a total of 30 gallons for the entire week for the generator.

I will reiterate my statement from earlier in this post about having a good gps system with an accurate maps system with a water level offset feature. On this trip the water level at LP was -152’, and the ability to put that into my chart with low level water color highlight will keep you far from trouble. On my chart it even has a center of channel line. The depth of the main channel was still 285’ in places but gets shallow quickly along the sides due to the nature of the geography of the lake.

Fuel: Next year Dangling rope marina should be back in operation so getting fuel will probably not be as much as a concern. I put a 22 gallon aux tank under my helm seat, and while I did use it, I didn’t need it for the day trips I took. Had I been a bit more aggressive in taking long cruises it definitely would have been used for those trips. Having said that, I will take that 22 gallon tank next year. I plan on doing some extensive touring of the lake next year.

As the lake changes depths, beaches either disappear or appear in different places, however, there are many places to camp along the shore. There is a requirement that all camps must have a porta potty type of toilet. This is not an issue as there are floating toilets along the lake where those could be emptied during your trip. A great source of info on LP is a forum called Wayne’s Words. I used that site extensively for my research for my trip and all the members there are super helpful and enthusiastic, like this forum.

In closing I would say that if you do your homework like I did you will have a very enjoyable and trip of a lifetime. If you have any questions feel free to ask.

 

[ChrisM]

Nice to see some water left in that lake..!!!
I plan to return myself soon.

 

[rad1026]

Yes, its been a few years since camped and explored the lake, but I will be back soon. It's just such an amazing place.

 

[RobbieO]

@RobbieO

Just returned from a one week houseboat trip to LP. I know you said you didn’t want to do a houseboat type of trip, but after being there I can’t imagine any other way to spend a week at LP with the size group we had. In the future I plan on going there by myself and camping off of my boat.
Beautiful…how was it manuvering those narrow channels?
We rented a 59’ Discovery XL out of Bullfrog. The boat served our group of 9 people and two dogs very well. One of the main things is keeping food items and beverages cold, this house boat has a residential fridge / freezer as well as a 5 cuft chest freezer out on the fore deck. These two cold boxes run off of an inverter that is fed from a large battery bank. We used the chest freezer to keep frozen items frozen, and each day we would freeze a flat of water bottles to put in ice chests. There is a 14KW gen set on board that we ran twice a day to recharge the batteries. The house boat also has AC which requires the gen set to be run. The gen set was super quiet and super efficient, we used a total of 30 gallons for the entire week for the generator.

I will reiterate my statement from earlier in this post about having a good gps system with an accurate maps system with a water level offset feature. On this trip the water level at LP was -152’, and the ability to put that into my chart with low level water color highlight will keep you far from trouble. On my chart it even has a center of channel line. The depth of the main channel was still 285’ in places but gets shallow quickly along the sides due to the nature of the geography of the lake.

Fuel: Next year Dangling rope marina should be back in operation so getting fuel will probably not be as much as a concern. I put a 22 gallon aux tank under my helm seat, and while I did use it, I didn’t need it for the day trips I took. Had I been a bit more aggressive in taking long cruises it definitely would have been used for those trips. Having said that, I will take that 22 gallon tank next year. I plan on doing some extensive touring of the lake next year. View attachment 164076View attachment 164077View attachment 164078View attachment 164079View attachment 164080View attachment 164076View attachment 164077View attachment 164078View attachment 164079View attachment 164080View attachment 164081View attachment 164082View attachment 164083View attachment 164084View attachment 164085View attachment 164086View attachment 164087View attachment 164088View attachment 164089View attachment 164090View attachment 164091View attachment 164092View attachment 164093View attachment 164094View attachment 164095View attachment 164096View attachment 164097View attachment 164098View attachment 164099View attachment 164100View attachment 164101View attachment 164102View attachment 164103View attachment 164104View attachment 164105

As the lake changes depths, beaches either disappear or appear in different places, however, there are many places to camp along the shore. There is a requirement that all camps must have a porta potty type of toilet. This is not an issue as there are floating toilets along the lake where those could be emptied during your trip. A great source of info on LP is a forum called Wayne’s Words. I used that site extensively for my research for my trip and all the members there are super helpful and enthusiastic, like this forum.

In closing I would say that if you do your homework like I did you will have a very enjoyable and trip of a lifetime. If you have any questions feel free to ask.