Gemcoska's PhotoBlog: 2017-07-01 Lake Havasu, 4th of July

July 4th Weekend - Lake Havasu, AZ

Another summer has arrived and another set of Havasu trips dot these summer weekends. In recent years, I've avoided the really big weekends out on the lake. The crowd is insane, everything is more expensive, the water is all chopped up, and there are a bunch of inexperienced boaters on the lake. This summer, however, we hit 2 of the 3 major weekends for Lake Havasu: Memorial Day and Fourth of July. Memorial Day was a free-for-all, party-your-ass-off, weekend; whereas July 4th was much more family oriented albeit, just as busy.

This trip consisted on both Lake Havasu long time veterans along with newbies to the lake. Brandon and Shy is the reason we had this trip, specifically requesting a July 4th trip last summer. With that much advance notice, I booked our place in Havasu back in January. Shy smuggled some super illegal filipino cornuts back from the P.I. a couple years back. I've been obsessed with them ever since. They say that the cornuts are so salty that one handful will instantly dehydrate the entire population of Los Angeles. That's why I had to eat them all myself and not share them with anyone.

Add to the trip, fellow wakeboarders and current residents of Edmonds, WA: Justin and Morgan. They were super pumped to get back on a wakeboard this summer and definitely got their pulls in.

Hot off his wakeboarding debut at Lake Elsinore, Alan gets his first taste of glassy water during our first sunrise wakeboard session. During the trip, he gets way better at riding and also learns an important lesson: if you hang your tongue out like Michael Jordan when you ride, you'll bite it off like Hannibal Lecter. Don't worry, Alan still has most of it left.

Lani joins us as the most unemployed person on the trip. She left Virgin Orbit literally hours before we left LA. She's now back in Colorado where the Coors flows from the factory like, well, like it does in Lake Havasu. When she's not traveling around the world, she'll be deciding between her 20 modes of transportation to and from her new job at the National Reusable Energy Lab (they make blim blams out of gork glups; j/k).

And of course Holly was there to not only celebrate my birthday on my birthday, but also for my entire birthday weekend! Apparently we partied to hard on my actual birthday and ended up with the flu all weekend and by the end of the weekend had pneumonia. Lesson learn: get sick at the end of your vacation, not at the beginning.

My Lake Havasu trips are very tailored to who comes on the trips, and this trip had mostly wakeboarders. The result? Early morning sessions everyday, and even a couple evening ones also. Check out these guys rip it.

The best part about waking up at 5:30 am to wakeboard is not only the great water conditions, its also that breakfast is 10x better after you've worked up an appetite. By 10 am, it feels like you've already done a full days worth of activities! That's probably why most of the people took naps after breakfast...

Nonetheless, after a quick nap, a few beer-mosas, some pumping up music, and perhaps a drinking game or two, we are all ramped up to head back out on the lake for some serious floating.

Being that July 4th was on a tuesday this year, we got 4 full days out on the lake. FANTASTIC! That also means we got to cover the lake pretty well, which includes a day at the historic sandbar. Back in its day, the Sandbar was THE spot. There used to be a large area of ankle deep water where you could walk around and party. The city has decided to flood the sandbar in recent years to keep the number of boaters to a manageable amount, as opposed to this.

While the sandbar has started to dwindle in its popularity, Copper Canyon still remains a frequently visited area. It is only about a 5 minute boat ride from the edge of Thompson Bay, and the high canyon walls makes the area feel like its a room on its own. When we were out for Memorial Day saturday, we got lined up with a dozen or so boats in a big party, but I still have never seen anything like this.

With the big two hot spots checked off the list, its time for my favorite place on the lake, Steamboat Cove! I heard someone in the marina saying that it was called Steamboat Cove because there is a sunken Steamboat down there and that you can dive down and still see it. I couldn't confirm that anywhere so I'm guessing that it was made up by a 16 year old who was trying to impress a girl, who then told her boyfriend, who was the captain of Esperanza High School football team and told all of them, who then told their older siblings, who then came to Lake Havasu for Fourth of July, who then told some people in line at the marina, which I totally overheard their conversation. But that's just a guess.

HOWEVER, Lake Havasu was named after the Mojave Indian Tribe's word for 'blue'. That was from the internet, so you know its true.

ANYHOW, Steamboat Cove is halfway to the best burgers on the lake and the strongest drinks on the lake, Havasu Springs bar. I've never left there unhappy, though every other time I'm there, some lady walks off with Miles.

Justin is a huge fan of Micro breweries and there are 3 or 4 in Lake Havasu, the best one being Hangar 24 which is part of the Lake Havasu airport for private planes. Instead of napping one night, Justin headed out there to check it out and ended up bringing back a few 6 packs which we very quickly broke into. The next night, we headed over to get out of the house and have a couple drinks and mix it up with the locals.

With our fourth and final full day in Lake Havasu, we decide on a relaxing day on the lake in preparation for a sunset evening in the lake as the sky falls and we get ready for fireworks. I've always thought that floating in the water and watching fireworks launch from 100 yard away was the coolest way to enjoy fourth of July fireworks. After doing it again this year, it is totally confirmed. While the lake is full of red, green, and white navigation lights from all the boats anchored in Thompson Bay, the sky looks empty and open, with only the light from the stars and the moon and the occasional quad-copter... If this sounds awesome to you, lemme know that you want to go next year and I'll book the place in January again!!