Our annual September Lake Powell trip was better then ever. (It even felt more like a vacation than a trip)  The weather for the most part stayed awesome giving us lots of glass for wakeboarding, surfing, sking and of course chasing boils. The main focus of the trip was water sports, since Liz and I had just picked up a Mastercraft X-30 the week before the trip. The ole Glastron was great and treated us well, but lets be real. Its not even close to as nice as an X-30.  With our new baby, I spent most of the off time checking out how things worked on the boat. (like the shower, bilge pump, ballast tanks, speakers, etc…) The rest of the time we hungout on the houseboat playing cards, eating, laying out, watching movies on the cliff walls and catching bass and carp that patrolled the houseboat. One of the best parts of the trip was that we didn’t have to go out side of our cove to find great fishing. The cove we stayed held lots of shad and where you find shad you find ambushing strippers and bass. So every morning and evening we listened for the boils and when we heard them its was an all out stampede to get to them before they stopped. In all it was a little piece of heaven on earth. There are few other things that rival a 7 day vacation to Lake Powell durning the first weekend in September. Its a magical place to say the least.  The pictures will help tell the rest of the story…

So  this past May the weather had a great time toying with us, some days were warm other were as cold as February. With this in mind and a close watch on the weather, I decided to head out to the lake in hopes of a summer like day and a little wakeboarding action. The water was glass, but was still wetsuit weather. (Which we didn’t have)  After a couple of runs we were froze, and just hung out wishing it was the August and 85 degree water. Sometimes its not about the action, but about the experience.  I bought a wetsuit today.

Over the past winter through spring and now into early summer, I have battled an addiction. That addiction was that I was spending countless hours working on and making changes to my motor boat and drift boat. (Known as my twin kids) I am a very hands on/active person so, hanging out in the garage doing little projects on my kids is something that is just as fun as actually using them.  But trust me, I will get them out now that they are starting to be where I want them. So here are a few of the improvements(I hope) I have made to the kids over the past few months.

Corna-(Drift Boat)

1. Raptor Lined the Inside Hull: The reason I decided to raptor line the inside of my boat was simple. I was sick of redoing it yearly, so I decided to choose something that was durable and can be easley cleaned by spraying it out. Plus it is waterproof and will help prolong the life of the boat.  To give it some more character(Like it needed it, with the lime green paint) I added black liner to the top sides and faded it into the white. Making it look tougher or something???

Before

After

2. Repainted the trailer: Having a nice boat, but a rusty trailer is not acceptable in my eyes. So I sanded it down, primed then spayed the whole thing with Rustolem Brand Truck Bed Liner Spray. Found it at Auto Zone for $8 buck a can. It seems to work a lot better then your typical spray paints. I have driven it to the Green a few times and it has held up great.

3. Repainted and varnished: Having a wood drift boat can be a lot of work if you make it. I decided to invest in nicer paint and varnish in hopes that it will last me longer than the cheaper stuff I have been using. It looks great and has been worth the extra cash so far.

Motor Boat

The motor boat has been a huge undertaking. I basically remodel the whole inside as well as added lots of cool little extras to make being out on the lake more enjoyable. 

1. Inside Seating/Upholstery: Out with the old and in with the new roomy wrap around seating.

Before

After

Added Bow Middle Cushion

Wrap Around Seating & Subs

Adjustable Swivel Captions Chair

2. Sound System: Whats better than chillin on a boat with your friends listing to good music? NOTHING. With this in mind I added a few more speakers(4) as well as a couple subs and tweets. 

3. Tower Lights and Speakers

4. Battery Switch: It allows me to change from battery 1, 2, both or off. This is great to charge both batteries at the same time as well as turning it off in-case you leave something on like the radio. Full batteries is the key.

5. Extended Swim Deck-Plywood coated in Raptor Truck Bed Liner

6. Repainted trailer: Same undertaking as the drift boat.

This years Lake Powell trip was full of surprises and great moments.  Originally we had planned on going to the Green River to celebrate Jordan’s homecoming, but with an invite to Powell and a nice houseboat the families plans changed within seconds.  I had mixed feelings about this as I love the Green more than anything and was looking forward to five days on the river, but I also was stoked to try out the new ski-boat and have the chance to chase some warm water fish and relax in the sun. The fishing kicked off as we were greeted with a boil in our bay as we returned from our afternoon boating. Jordan hooked up on his first cast and if it wasn’t for a crazy girl on a wave runner doing donuts around us and putting down all the fish we would have had a night.  But for anyone who has fished this amazing fishery, knows that with a little effort you can find some of the best warm water fishing in the country. We tasted a little of that as our crew caught smallmouths, largemouths, stripers, carp, catfish, sunfish, and bluegill. In all it was a great trip and one step closer to figuring out this vast reservoir of water and catching a over sized stiper on my fly rod. 

Gunners Large and Smallmouths

As far as the boating goes the weather was excellent, giving us nice water and some of the best wakeboarding, wakesurfing conditions. Fall is definatily my favorite time to be on the lake.

Life has changed a lot these past couple weeks. First off after years of wanting to get a Ski Boat,  everything came together and we got the perfect boat for us. Its a 19ft Glastron…

Now that we had our boat we needed to upgrade to something that could put it a little better. It was sad to sell my trusted Jeep, but I have been able to get over it pretty quick with the fully loadedYukon Denali. Its a sweet ride.

So lots of changes for a week…Buy a boat, buy a Denali, sell the Jeep, sell a scooter and all the little things that come with each purchase and sell.

Then the fun began with getting the toys to fill the boat. Wakeboards, Wakeskate, Tube, ropes, helmet, etc…

But now the work is done we can enjoy the rest of the summer!!! I love living 5 mins from Utah Lake we have hit it 5 times this week after work. The only break was Weds to hit a caddis hatch…Life is good