Lake Powell

Saturday morning we went to the Lake Powell boat rental site at the Wahweap Marina, and we picked up our 19-ft motorboat with a broken gas gauge and headed out for adventure. Unfamiliar with the lake, we weren’t entirely sure where to go, and with the water level constantly changing, creating islands out of peninsulas and vice-versa the crude map only helped a little. After a few wrong turns into dead-end bays, we finally got our bearings and made our way upstream.

Lake Powell is formed by the damming of the Colorado River, and the filling of Glenn Canyon. Somewhat similar to the Grand Canyon, there are many smaller canyons off to the side of the main channel, and we spent our time exploring those.

The weather was about as perfect as you could ask for with sunny skies, highs in the lower 90’s, lows in the 50’s-60’s, and water temperature of about 70 degrees. When we got hot from being in the sun, we simply found a nice spot, turned the motor off, and jumped in the water.

After going down Navajo and Antelope Canyons on Saturday, we headed farther upstream to Gregory Butte at the end of Last Chance Bay, and we found a nice beach to spend the night on. In one direction, we had a view up the river for about 6 or 7 miles, and there were beautiful mesas, buttes, and mountains in every direction. We cooked up some dinner, had some beers on the boat before heading up the beach a little ways to lay out our sleeping bags, watch the end of the sunset and the bats flying and swooping every-which-way, listen to the coyotes howl, and fall asleep without another person in sight. In the middle of the night, we both woke up a few times to some strange noises, slightly surprised to find we weren’t in a tent, but then we’d look up at the stars and the big, clear Milky Way streaking across the sky, and drift back to sleep.

We awoke the next morning before dawn, pleasantly surprised to find that the boat was right where we left it. I wanted to document all this with pictures, but alas, I only took a couple of pictures of our boat on the beach when the batteries died, and without any spares we were left pictureless on Sunday. After packing up our belongings and having a quick breakfast, we headed further upstream.

Our first stop was at Rainbow Bridge National Monument, the largest natural bridge in the world, measuring over 300-ft wide, and over 200-ft tall. The only way to get there is by boat, followed by a short walk up an easy trail; otherwise it is a very long, very hot trek through Navajo country. Since we got there early, we had the place to ourselves, which was quite nice considering the canyon has quite an echo, which I happily made full use of.

We spent the rest of the day going down other narrow canyons, seeing how far we could get while marveling at the steep, red, sandstone walls that jutted straight out of the water. I thought the best one was Secret Canyon – so named because it’s a little tricky to find I guess, and not marked very well on the map. In any case, it was very narrow, and we eventually had to stop, not because it got too shallow, but because it got too narrow. We reached a point where the boat was touching the canyon walls on both sides and could not go any further, so we backed out for almost a quarter mile before I could use my superior boat-handling skills, and make about a 16-point, Austin Powers style turn so that we could go forward again.

We eventually made our way back to the marina, never having run out of gas, and having had a lot of fun. Rafting down Glenn Canyon before the dam was there must have been truly spectacular.

Leaving the lake, we stopped by Glenn Canyon Dam, and took the tour.