Before hitting Lake Powell, Dad/Lamar, Mom/Margie and Derek had gone down to Moab to see the arches. Gray and Jen were in Moab for a Blackham Family Reunion, but hooked up for some hiking and then joined the family for Powell play. Wendy and Rick and Shane (who had stayed to finish up some school) met the family in Moab, unfortunately having car trouble along the way. This did get its own blog post ... Off to the Arches. After the arches ... it was on to Lake Powell!
04 September (Saturday) We got up early, having to leave by 7:00 to make our scheduled rendezvous with Sharon and Kent at the Bullfrog Marina at 10:00. Jen and Grayson joined us around 7:00, and we had been out trying to resolve the problem with Wendy's car. We had Shane and Derek join with Gray and Jen and head out to meet Sharon and Kent. After about half an hour, they walked back to the motel, having had a flat tire. They got it all fixed and we had Wendy's car towed to the Chevron station, where someone would look at it on Monday. Then we took in Wendy and Rick, and we tooled off toward Lake Powell, with two cars jammed full of bags and people. We had called to leave a message at the marina that we would be late, 12:00 instead of 10:00. Then the trip took longer than we had anticipated, and we didn't get there until about 12:15. We couldn't see anyone there, but we left a few notes on the bulletin boards, and read a few notes and tried to locate the Amanns by land. After awhile, they came into the marina and took all us stragglers in on their boat, along with a really full boatload of bags and other equipment. We motored over to the houseboat. Alyson and Brian and their two boys, Brandon and Daniel were there, and my sister Diane and her friend Randy, and Ryan and his friend Jeff Larkin. One group of skiers went out, and did some late afternoon skiing, but a windstorm and thunderstorm came up. Shane and Wendy and Rick and Grayson got to ski. We had a nummy meal of salmon that night, cooked by Kent, who had caught it earlier on his trip to Alaska. We all got situated in our sleeping places, and we had a little rain, but it didn't amount to much, which was a good thing, as most of us were out under the stars without a lot of overhead protection. We had a pretty good night's sleep.
05 September (Sunday) We played around the houseboat, and on the shore, and took some nice hikes up around the slickrock. We also did some fishing. I had brought one outfit, and we ended up catching four different kinds of fish: carp (about 5), bass (2), catfish (1) and bluegill (about 5). We did a lot of frisbee throwing, and swimming. Kent tried to resolve some of the houseboat problems; one engine in the ater and not startable, the potty full and not working well, some of the pontoons full of water. We tried to pump out the pontoons, but there was apparently as much water coming in as was being pumped out. Then Kent decided to head over to a place closer to the marina, since he'd already made plans for them to pick up the houseboat at 7:30 Monday morning for the necessary repairs. We tooled up on one engine to the potty pumper, and got the potty problems fixed, and then went to an inlet nearby the marina. We had a nice barbequed chicken dinner, and settled down in our new home. We slept pretty soundly again, without the storm threats of the prior night.
06 September (Monday) We got up quite early to get the houseboat over to the boat dock, where it was hoisted up onto the truck and hauled ashore. We unloaded all of the bags and stuff into the cars, and then reloaded the boat with what we needed for the day's water activities. Marge opted to stay with the houseboat in the repair area, while the rest of us went back to where the houseboat had been parked to get in some more boating and waterskiing. Shane, Wendy, Rick and Grayson all had turns up on the skis while Derek and Ryan and Jeff stayed on shore and hiked around and did some beachcombing. Then we went out with the smaller kids and Derek tried the skis, and was able to get up with some help from Wendy in the water. We tooled around the bay twice before Kent dropped him off in front of our swimming hole. Ryan and Jeff rode the kneeboard. We returned to the houseboat where we cleaned up everything. Then we hauled all of the stuff back to the boat ramp and unloaded, and got the stuff into the cars. Our two cars headed back North about 2:30 with the same crews as to Powell from Moab. We stopped in Price at the Pizza Hut for dinner, and then continued on to good old SLC. We got home about 9:00. Rick's car, parked in our driveway wouldn't start. We jumped it to resolve that problem. We'd had enough car problems for a while!
In the next journal entry back home, Dad mentioned feeling woozy (like he was still on a boat) and that Derek was sick that first night home. Still rocking! Wendy probably has a pretty good write up (I/Jen checked my journal ... I wrote before and after this but didn't get around to writing about the trip. We do have a few pictures from before, in Moab so I'm not sure why I didn't get some pictures at Powell). Wendy did though!
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