save the wells

For the 4th of July weekend we went to Lake Powell with some of Shayla's family. Shayla has already posted some pictures, so I will give a quick rundown of what happened. We left Thursday after I got off work. We stayed on Jeremy's new houseboat. It's pretty small. I think I heard someone saying it was the smallest boat on the lake. I'm not sure if that's something I'd want to brag about, but whatever.

We had a good time at the lake. We spent Thursday night on the boat in the marina, and then headed out early Friday morning. The pass over Antelope Island is finally open again after five years of low water left it high and dry. We took advantage of the shortcut to Padre Bay and headed over there to park the boat. Shayla's aunt and uncle were staying on Jeremy's other houseboat in a cove sheltered by tall sandstone walls on three sides. We pulled up next to them. For the next two and a half days we kayaked, wakeboarded, boated, helicoptered, eated, swimed and watched moviesed. It was a blast!

Of course, our trip wasn't without incident. Early Saturday strong winds blew and rocked the houseboats. The boat we were staying on swayed back and forth, but the anchors held. The houseboat next to us, which just happened to be the boat Shayla's aunt and uncle were on, had much bigger problems. One of the anchors pulled out, causing the boat to drift towards our houseboat. In the process, the ski boat tied to the back swung around between the drifting houseboat and the shore. The prop of the ski boat got stuck in the sand and the houseboat kept pushing toward our houseboat and the shore. I thought the ski boat was going to get smashed! A few of us tried to push the ski boat out of the way until others could untie it and move it out of the way. Now there was just us between the houseboat and the shore, and the houseboat kept moving in! We tried as hard as we could to push the houseboat away from shore until we could tie a little four person Sea-Doo jet boat to the back of the houseboat. Now I know what you're thinking, a little tiny boat and three or four guys pushing are not going to move a huge houseboat in strong winds. And for a minute or two, I was thinking the same thing, but then somehow that big huge houseboat moved out into open water. I was amazed that nothing happened to any of the boats, jet skis, or people involved.

Later that day the winds died down and Jeremy was flying us all around in his new Eurocopter. As we were flying over the lake, we noticed a park ranger boating below us, trying to follow us around. Jeremey had been landing on a small rock in the middle of the lake all day, and according to National Park regulations, it is against the law to land aircraft on all National Park lands. Jeremy, being well aware of this decided to toy around with the rangers a bit. We would fly over a fin of rock to a different part of the lake, only to watch the rangers turn around and come after us. When they were turned around and headed our direction, Jeremy would fly back over to the previous arm of the lake we were just in, causing the rangers to flip around and come back to where they just were. We went back and forth like this for a while, watching the rangers try their best to keep up with us. Jeremy then would fly low and out of their sight only to pop up somewhere they probably weren't expecting us. After a while it looked like the rangers were not going to give up the cat and mouse chase, so Jeremy flew back to the airport to get some gas and let the rangers move on to something else.

As we were flying back to the landing rock, we saw the rangers out in the open and a good distance from where we were going to land. As we made our way to the rock, the rangers flipped around and chased us down. We all got out of the helicopter as quickly as we could and hopped into the getaway boat that was waiting for us. As Jeremy was getting ready to take off, the ranger came cruising in at top speed and motioned for Jeremy to cut the engine. We took off in the boat, leaving Jeremy to face the rangers. Two and a half hours later, he was the proud owner of an "aircraft parking ticket".

The rest of the trip was not near as exciting but was still full of fun. We hung out on the houseboat, took the ski boat out for some wakeboarding and wakesurfing, and jumped off the top of the houseboat into the lake. It was a fun trip. Thanks Jeremy and Sharla for such a memorable adventure!

Here are some more pictures and a few videos of the trip.

Max loved all the toys at Lake Powell!

Jeremy's helicopter flying over the lake.

A view of Lake Powell from the air.

This is the rock Jeremy was landing his helicopter on.

Here's Ryan ripping it up on the wakesurfer.

This is Max's reaction to the helicopter ride.

Here's Jeremy landing the small helicopter on the houseboat,
after getting a ticket for landing his big helicopter on the rock.