Chuck Leinweber invited me to join a group of folks at Lake Powell in June. This messabout has been going on for years and is commonly referred to as the Kokopelli cruise. I planned on getting my Michalak designed shantyboat, “Shanteuse”, finished in time for the messabout, but was unable to complete it by then. So I purchased a canoe a couple of weeks before the trip, and my daughter Cathy joined me for the adventure. I was nervous about the trip as I had not paddled a canoe in years; and that only for a brief hour on a secluded creek. Capsizing the canoe during the trip was my biggest concern, but we never did.
We met the Leinwebers on Hobie Cat Beach Sunday afternoon. Several of the folks attending were still hours out so we opted to go ahead and launch and let the others catch up with us later. We didn’t travel far that first day so it didn’t seem to be a problem for the latecomers. That first night we set up camp in the Stanton Creek area. Cathy and I provided the meal for the first night: chili beans made with ground chicken. People kept arriving at different times throughout the evening, so it took a while for everyone to get done with supper. Since we didn’t travel far the first part of the trip seemed easy. But we made up for it later.
The second day brought us close to Forgotten Canyon. Tom Gale brought four teenagers in an eighteen foot sailboat with a small motor on the back. As we were paddling along he cruised on ahead to scout for good camping spots. This was the norm for the trip. Finding a spot that second night proved difficult though, all the good spots were taken by houseboats. We spent a lot of time just sitting in our boats in the shade close to the canyon wall. Someone joked that it was like we were in Waterworld because we couldn’t get out of our boats. Eventually we found a small area where we could get out and stretch our legs while Tom continued searching for a good camping spot for the night.
In my correspondence with Chuck about Lake Powell, he frequently mentioned that it was not a good lake to go sailing on. Tom Gale sailed in that first evening. In fact, the sailing was so good that he opted for a late supper to get in more sailing. As things turned out, Tom got to do a lot of sailing during this trip. He also brought a small sailboat and a double kayak, which the teenagers sailed and paddled around at various times during the trip. After we made camp, Tom sometimes took the little sailboat out for a while. He did have to run his outboard on the bigger sailboat to get where he was going for part of the trip. The group normally does this trip in September and there is usually not much wind that time of year (or so I’m told).
June is probably not the best time to camp at Lake Powell. With temperatures above a hundred during the day, the sand and rocks are storing up heat in the day and releasing it at night. When I was trying to sleep at night I could feel the heat radiating from the ground. I did notice that the Leinweber’s son, Joe, stretched out on a cot at night, placing him a good distance off of the ground. I have a feeling he slept much cooler than I did, but there was no way that I had room for a cot in our canoe, even if I had thought to bring one. The canoe felt overloaded as it was.
The scenery was incredible. After hiking around I discovered that there were different levels of camp sites. As the water levels change over the years, people camp at higher or lower elevations accordingly. Some of the upper levels had amazing views and probably would have been better camping spots, except it would have been hard to haul all our equipment up and down the rocks to get there. I didn’t see any big trees around, but in some of the places we camped we came across giant logs left from old dead cottonwoods. Looking out over the lake from higher up brought a feeling of serenity and the view of the stars at night was breathtaking. It’s been a long time since I’ve been anywhere remote enough to get that kind of view.
While my daughter and I never capsized our canoe, we had a couple of close calls as some of the big house boats went by. They threw some large wakes and a couple of times we took waves over the side of the canoe. Several times we got sideways to the wakes, and the canoe rocked vigorously back and forth. Sometimes I held my breath until the wakes died down. On the third day we arrived at Good Hope Bay. This was one of the longest days on the water, and though we developed a rhythm for our paddling by this point my arms got really tired and they were sore before the day was over. Good Hope was the turnaround point for our trip. The last long stretch we paddled through before turning the corner into Good Hope seemed like it would never end. By the time we arrived I was ready to get out and stretch my legs. We were all tired. I don’t think anybody in our group wanted to spend more time looking for a camping spot that evening. The spot we picked wasn’t necessarily the best one, but it did come into shade much sooner than anywhere else we could have camped that night.
As the trip progressed sometimes Cathy and I kept up with the group really well, but other times it was a struggle as they appeared to be getting further away from us. That really annoyed me when I felt like we were working hard and the folks ahead of us seemed to be taking it easy. The rest of the group were seasoned paddlers, and the narrower more efficient lines of the kayaks made them faster. The Leinwebers brought their home-built, Michalak designed kayaks. They seemed to have no trouble paddling off ahead of us with ease. I knew I shouldn’t have eaten all those Oreos. It would also have helped if I hadn’t piled so much stuff in our canoe when we packed. I could have saved a lot of weight if we had simply brought a water filter like everyone else, instead of lugging all those water bottles and a seven gallon water container with us. Fortunately the canoe got lighter as we used most of the water by the end of the trip, but we still weren’t as fast as everyone else.
Kim Apel had an open canoe, but it was a narrower design than ours (at least on the ends) and he had set it up with a sliding seat rowing rig. I’m not sure how long the oars were on his boat, but they seemed huge to me. I guess he was working at it, but Kim seemed able to make his canoe do whatever he wanted with little effort. He appeared to mysteriously get way ahead of others, or at least me and my daughter. Sometimes he would start off behind and then pass by without us noticing. It threw me a couple of times as I couldn’t figure out when he passed by. It was not uncommon to catch up to him having a nap in his canoe in the shade. With those outriggers mounted on the sides to support the long oars I would have been banging into everything around me. He drew the oars back in an easy, fluid motion with the oars just above the water. It was like watching a ballet. Here is our new canoe loaded on the truck.
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Here is a shot of our canoe, all loaded and ready to launch for our grand adventure. Cathy is just waiting for me to help her get the canoe in the water. |
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Here is a shot of several of the boats beached at our first night's campsite, one of the easier places we had to beach the boats. |
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Here is a photo of me and Cathy starting to back out of a narrow inlet. I'm afraid I was pretty awkward trying to maneuver the boat in tight spaces. I kept hitting the end of the canoe against the rocks because I would forget to look back. |
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Here is a shot of my favorite place to be when we were on the water, in the shade! |
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Here is a shot of me being lazy and taking a break from paddling to eat a snack. I didn't know Cathy was going to take this picture of me. |
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This is proof that I really did get in a canoe and paddle on Lake Powell, a shot of me and Cathy paddling. I really was there. |
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This is a shot of a couple of the kayaks ahead of us and part of the canyon walls. I like this photo because it gives an idea of the scale of the canyon walls and the lake. |
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This is Tom's sailboat towing the kayak. |
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This is folks unloading gear and getting ready to set up camp. |
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Folks relaxing before it's time to start fixing supper and get tents setup. |
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Glorious shade! The trip would have been miserable without a little shade. |
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Here is a shot of the smaller sailboat which Tom towed at times. The boys were sailing it part of the time. In the evenings or sometimes on lunch breaks Tom would sail it. |
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A nice view of the lake and the landscape without the sun blazing down on us. Lake Powell is a beautiful place. |
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Here is a shot of tents set up in the evening. Even though the outside air temperature did cool down in the evenings, there was still a lot of heat radiating from the ground up into our tents at night. |
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Here Chuck took a picture from underneath his umbrella. I was kicking myself for not thinking to bring one, but Chuck and Sandra were very kind to share whenever we were on the beach. |
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A shot of folks relaxing after supper. |
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I think this is a shot of Hal getting ready to practice with his sailing rig that he whipped up. It also shows a good view of Kim's. |
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This is a nice shot of Hal in the bay with no other boats around. This seems like a photo you would have on one of those inspirational posters. I wish I could take credit for it but chuck sent me most of these photos. I'm afraid I spent too much time gawking at the lake and didn't remember to take enough photos myself. Anyway this is one of my favorite photos from the trip. |
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This is a shot of the really small beach we were forced to land on because of the wind. One can argue if it was divine providence or not that caused us to land there, but it was very fortunate for the gentleman that Kim found stranded there. |
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I think Joe had the right idea here. It was siesta time. I think several of us took naps that day. |
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It was kind of amazing to me to see these cattails in the midst of all the rock and sand. It was a very bold contrast with all the rock. And somehow it even made me feel a few degrees cooler. |
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Here is a photo of the shelter the stranded gentleman spent time in to get out of the hot sun. |
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Here is a photo of work the stranded gentleman did to rock in part of his shelter and make it more like a room. I was very impressed with the rock work he did. |
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This is the last photo, a group shot of everyone together. I can't imagine a better group of people to have done this trip with. Thank you all, we had an amazing time! |
Here is a video of Hal rolling his kayak and getting his expensive chocolate all wet. The way the nose is swept up on his kayak it seems like it would be a lot more difficult to roll than other kayaks I've seen.
One thing we came to appreciate very much while on this trip was shade. Both Kim and Chuck had shade sails that could be set up with some poles. Even a little shade was a welcome luxury in the hot sun. The wind didn’t always cooperate with us when we were trying to get the shade set up. Sometimes it took several of us to hang onto lines and poles while others would drive in the stakes and tension the lines. This frequently involved bringing big rocks over to hold down the lines. It didn’t take long after they were set up for several of us to be underneath them, trying to get out of the sun. The Leinwebers also brought umbrellas with them which they frequently opened up while they were paddling along. I was kicking myself for not thinking far enough ahead to bring umbrellas for me and my daughter. Of course I’m not sure where we would have packed them on the canoe.
Hal Link had a very nice kayak. It looked designed for speed, and I think it was made from Kevlar. He also seemed able to zip off to places with little effort. Hal tried out Kim’s canoe with the sliding seat rowing rig one afternoon. While he was not as smooth as Kim he seemed to quickly pick up the knack for it. He practiced rolling his kayak while we were at Good Hope. That looked extremely difficult to me. Some of us stood on the shore and laughed at him while he practiced the rolls, but I have a great deal of respect for anyone who can manage that, and he was successful at it. They would probably have to rescue me if I had tried it. A note to those who wish to practice rolling their kayaks, always take your expensive chocolate out and put it someplace safe before you start practicing your rolls. Additionally, once the chocolate has dried out it tastes just as good!
Hal broke out a sailing rig for his kayak while we were at Good Hope. He practiced some in the evening with it, and then used it a few times the next day as well. Chuck got out his umbrella and raced Hal with his sailing rig. I’m not sure how much of a race it really was but Chuck gave Hal a hard time about beating his sailing rig with an umbrella. There were some very lively discussions about triangular sails versus balanced lugs. I don’t think Chuck managed to convince Hal that a balanced lug was better, but the arguments and good natured ribbing were entertaining.
Wednesday night we camped in Cedar Canyon. I loved camping in Cedar canyon and the geography of the rock walls. On the beach there were several levels to climb up and look around with some panoramic views. In the evenings, most of us took the opportunity to get in the lake and cool off. The temperature difference was quite a shock to the system, but it felt so good. The only downside to camping there (and it was a big one) was the surprising amount of motor boat traffic coming through. That did drop off in the evening though.
When we left Cedar Canyon back toward Bullfrog on Thursday morning there was a wind advisory out predicting 50 mile an hour winds. Unfortunately we didn’t get moving very fast until after breakfast. Tom made us all pancakes that morning and we savored every morsel. Thank you Tom, they were delicious! Of all mornings to be lollygagging around though, this was the worst one we could have picked. After breakfast everyone realized that we needed to get moving so we could try to beat the wind to our next stop.
Concerned about the potential effect of the predicted winds, our fellow travelers finally mentioned that maybe Cathy and I could improve our paddling strokes (or maybe it was just me that needed to make the improvement). It would have been nice if they had mentioned this earlier in the trip, but I think they were worried about hurting my ego; a needless worry, as I knew I was clueless. All this time I had been making big splashes with my paddling, very inefficient. They wanted to make sure we were as efficient as possible with the approaching high winds. After receiving some coaching on the proper technique from Hal, our paddling efficiency improved a great deal. Kim also demonstrated some other paddling strokes to keep our canoe tracking better. I have to confess I didn’t do very well with those and will need more practice to utilize them effectively. Sometimes I’m a little slow at learning new things.
When it was time to leave, everyone packed up quickly. The others were more efficient than I was and they were away while we were still trying to get everything stuffed into our canoe. I think the knowledge that high winds were coming gave us an extra burst of adrenaline that morning though, because it didn’t take long for us to start catching up. Part of the group would fall back occasionally to make sure we were doing ok. We paddled for all we were worth that morning. Eventually the wind kicked up and kept getting worse. After a time the group decided it was best to pull in and wait for the following morning to proceed. The spot we pulled into was not the best, but we didn’t have any other options.
Kim went hiking up over the hill and found a gentleman who was stranded there for several days when his kayak disappeared. The man had rocked in part of a low overhang to turn it into a shelter, out of the relentless heat of the sun. After getting him some food and water, Kim led him back over the hill to the beach side where some folks picked him up to meet up with the National Park Service. We heard they got him back to his car in Hite. I’m not sure why he was unable to flag someone else down to help him before we showed up. I’m just glad Kim found him and we were able to get him some help. VHF radios are most helpful in these situations. I don’t have one, but fortunately others did.
Friday morning we got up around 4:00 or 4:30. Everyone was set to go very quickly. We wanted to make it back to Bullfrog before the winds kicked up again. There was no wind when we got up. Everything was calm. As we paddled in that hour when it’s almost light but the sun hasn’t come up yet, no one spoke. We were in another world. The only sounds we heard were water dripping off of our paddles and the lake gently lapping at the canyon walls. I felt if anyone were to speak it would break the magic of that special time as we were all moving through the surreal moment of Lake Powell. It was like being in a dream that I didn’t want to wake up from. Unfortunately there were some other kayakers that camped in the vicinity and departed around the same time we did. Apparently they didn’t understand the need for quiet with the rest of us because they began talking and their voices echoed off of the rock walls. I guess the magic couldn’t last forever.
We made it back to Hobie Cat Beach without incident and then came the hard work of getting the boats unloaded, everything repacked in the vehicles and the boats mounted on trailers, or in our case on an overhead rack. We were lucky having everyone there with us to help get our canoe out, cleaned off and loaded. This would have been very difficult with just me and my daughter. The best part about getting back was being able to take a hot shower. Even though we showered before traveling very far in our truck, we had to air out the truck after we got home. The rope, cargo straps, and lines didn’t smell very good after being out on the lake all that time. We had to hose off all of our equipment and hang it out to dry in the back yard when we got home.
The evening we got back, everyone got together for one last meal at the Anasazi restaurant at the Lodge. It was a wonderful meal and we had a lot of fun talking about our journey on the lake. There was a lot of laughter, toasts, and storytelling going on. We had some incredible meals on the lake, a great adventure, campfires with discussions of Kokopellis past and other life stories, remembrances of those who have paddled on before, awesome views of the stars, and a lot of quality time spent with good people. I don’t think anyone got hurt, with the exception of some sunburns, and we all had a good time. What more can you ask for? I certainly hope to go back again.
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