Boat Ride On The Lake & An RV-Dreams Facebook Group - (Chester, CA)

As usual, we didn't get going on our day off.  And we couldn't really decide what to do.

There are several waterfalls in the area, and we want to see them.  But some of the better ones are several miles away and our slow start made us put off those road trips.

Linda did a little more in the garden and made a trip to town to mail bracelets while I was wrapping up some computer stuff.

One new thing is an RV-Dreams.com Group on Facebook.  I had tossed that idea around several times, but I really didn't know that much about Facebook and hadn't taken the time to look into it thoroughly.  However, NorCal Dan on the Forum created the Group this past week and sent me an email.

After some discussion back and forth, I joined Facebook, joined the Group, and he transferred administration powers to me.  So, for all our readers that are Facebook members, there is one more way to communicate and tell others about our little community.  Thanks Dan.  :)

I am by no means a Facebook expert, so I will probably have to tweak some settings along the way.  Just let me know.  :)

We finally got going and took one of the campground's motorboats out around noon or so.  It was a beautiful day, but clouds were building in the northwest.  We should have gone earlier and we knew we were going to have to return sooner than we wanted.

Still, we ventured out.  The water was calm and a pristine green.

From the campground, we headed east to The Peninsula.  The Peninsula sort of cuts the lake in half making it shaped somewhat like a heart lying on its side.  The north side is shallower and the south end is deeper where the dam is.  The Peninsula juts out from the east and points to the west side of the lake.

The Peninsula is mostly made up of the Lake Almanor Country Club gated community with fabulous homes on the shoreline.

Several, like the one above, have tracks down the steep slopes with mini-trams to take the residents up and down.

As we motored on, we came across a large flock of Western Grebes.

Lake Almanor is a breeding spot for Western and Clark's Grebes.  The flock all dove at once and then they started popping up all around the boat.

It's hard to get shots of moving birds in a bobbing boat.  :)

We witnessed the courting rituals which we have seen on various nature shows.  Of course, I couldn't get good pictures of that, so I borrowed this YouTube video to show you what we saw.

That was cool.  :)

As we continued along the western side of The Peninsula, there were several more lovely homes.

After we rounded the point of The Peninsula, we eventually stopped and had lunch as we floated.  But then our sun went away and the clouds were building even more.

We were a long way from our dock and it was going to be a rough ride home.  The wind and waves picked up and we realized we were a very small boat on a very big lake.

But we slowly plugged away and stayed close to shore.  Amazingly, it never rained on us.  It was a bouncy ride, but we made it back to the safety of our shallow water dock around 3:30.

I was manuevering the boat into its slip and Linda was complimenting my captaining skills when I realized I hadn't prepared to actually stop the boat.  I accidently gunned the throttle in my attempt to turn off the motor.

I flew off the back seat and hit the kill switch while sprawled on the floor of the boat.  It was quite graceful.  Too bad there was no video of that.  :)

Fortunately, there was a tie-up rope across the slip that kept us from ramming the dock.  I got composed and we got tied up and unloaded.

We had a good time, but in the future we will take the boat out earlier in the morning when it is consistently calm long before the afternoon winds pick up.

In the evening, we went into Chester for dinner at The Knotbumper restaurant.  It's sort of a sandwich, sub, soup, & salad place.  Prices are reasonable and the food was decent.

It was a slow-paced day off, but we got our first boat ride on the lake.  :)

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Comments

[Jerry and Suzy LeRoy]

Howard and Linda, good for you to take it easy in the morning, then out for a good day! All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, and Jill a dull girl, so you need time to play.

Love the Grebes dancing!

[Jesse]

1st thing I do when I do something embarrassing is to look around to see if anyone is watching me.

[Susan Anderson]

I'm with Linda on the two hour wake up with the coffee, it's mandatory otherwise I am no fun to be around.

Often those unplanned days are the most needed and fun.

[Sue]

Love the docking 'incident' ~ hilarious!! :)))