View allAll Photos Tagged Paddleboard
Note: this photo was published in Flickr's "Explored" list for Jul 17, 2014.
FWIW, the view here is looking south -- with Wild Horse Island, Big Arm, and Polson off in the distance (or, more likely, completely out of sight around the left side of the lake). Kalispell and Whitefish are essentially behind the spot from which this photo was taken...
**********************
In 1996 and 1997, I spent two full summers in the tiny little town of Polson, on the southern shore of Flathead Lake (the largest freshwater lake west of the Mississippi River), and grew quite attached to the town and its surrounding mountains, rivers, and lake -- photos of which you can see here and here. You might also be interested in some of my observations about life in Polson and Montana, which I wrote about in blogs titled The Polson Parade, and Leaving Montana. But then life changed, other things intervened, and I drifted away from Montana altogether.
In the summer of 2010, I had a chance to re-visit Polson, and spend three short days driving around to re-acquaint myself with the area. It had been over a dozen years since I was last there (not counting a brief drive-through with my younger son in 2006), so I was expecting some changes ... but in general, the town of about 5,000 people was pretty much the same. My favorite restaurant had closed down, a Mailboxes Etc outlet had been replaced by a video-rental outlet, and the local McDonald's outlet was no longer posting all of the bounced checks from desperate customers on its wall. It looked like some of the local ranchers and farmers had sold off some of their acreage, for there were a few new "vacation communities" filling up what had been open meadows and pasture just outside of town.
But the lake had not changed at all, and the Mission Mountains along the eastern shore of the lake were as pretty as ever. Just for the heck of it, I got up at 5 AM one morning, and photographed the pre-dawn stillness on the lake, and then the changing colors of clouds above the lake as the sun slowly rose up to peek over the top of the mountains. Unfortunately, I didn't have time to drive down to the Kerr Dam, and I didn't drive all the way around the north end of the lake: I only made it up to Big Fork on the eastern side, and LakeSide on the western side of the lake. I was going to take the half-day white-water rafting trip down the Flathead River, south of the dam, but there wasn't time for that, either ... Nor was there any time for fishing, or even to rent a jet-ski and zoom around on the broad expanse of water in Polson Bay, at the south end of the lake.
I took a bunch of photos throughout the visit, and you can view them here) on Flickr. And after my return from that 2010 trip, I happened to chat with a business colleague about Polson and heard some great things from him about a “dude ranch” located just outside Big Fork, right on the shore of the lake. It was the Flathead Lake Lodge, and after a few more years of distractions and delays, I managed to get most (but not all) of my family together for a weeklong vacation at the lodge. The weather was great, the food was delicious, the horses were cooperative, the lake was beautiful … and that’s pretty much what you’ll see in the photos that I’ve put into this album.
Enjoy … and, if you get the chance, gather your own family together and take them out to the Flathead Lake Lodge for a week. You won’t regret it!
Stand Up Paddle Boarding on a lake. This image is released under Creative Commons. Feel free to use and please credit Happiness Without, linking the credit through to www.happinesswithout.com
Around here, it's called the dam race.
Stand up paddle boarding (SUP) competition
PADDLE BOARD & OUTRIGGER RACE on the Colorado River
Another Dam Race - ADR | Sat Nov 4, 2017
Race started at River Lodge Resort on Parker Dam Road, Parker Dam.