Yellowstone Lake
- Thread starter Blake
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This was also in 2007, our second night was at Peale Island. We had to get special permission to camp here. The last shot was the morning. You are not allowed to use a motor at the very southern ends of the South and Southeast Arms, so we used two 8 ft oars to paddle out of the bay and away from the Island. Eventually the wind came up and we tacked all the way up the Southeast arm, but we paddled a 26S for about a half mile and it actually moved!
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Great pics and wonderful place to sail. Noticed your mast roller in the stern, did you buy or make that? Looks better than the board in my 92 26s and can be left in place.
Jansen, the mast roller came with my used boat and attaches to the stern rail. It works pretty well although I still have to go back to the stern and lift the mast through when it reaches the hounds where the shrouds attach. I think "hounds" are the proper term, but if not I hope somebody lets me know. If you look at the mast roller you will see it has a definite bend to starboard. This was caused by a 100 mph wind that hit the boat last November while sitting on its trailer under it's winter tarp. At 2 AM I was climbing the stern ladder to cut the tarp free, the whole 30' x 20' thing flapping loose except were it was tied to the mast at the roller. I'm glad I wasn't out on the water somewhere.
Walt, Yellowstone is a beautiful place to sail, if you ever make it up let me know.
Walt, Yellowstone is a beautiful place to sail, if you ever make it up let me know.
Yellowstone
Know that Yellowstone Lake has a lot of restrictions. You must register a camping itinerary with the rangers, and you may not deviate. Your campsite on the lake will be hours distant from where you parked, making it very difficult to see any of the "traditional" Yellowstone sights.
Last year when we camped the lake, it was very beautiful except for the active forest fire. Dark of the moon and smokey air meant night travel was accomplished by compass and GPS.
We drove nearby to Jackson Lake which was very scenic with a lot less regulations. Thunderstorms occur on both lakes and will test your preparedness.
Know that Yellowstone Lake has a lot of restrictions. You must register a camping itinerary with the rangers, and you may not deviate. Your campsite on the lake will be hours distant from where you parked, making it very difficult to see any of the "traditional" Yellowstone sights.
Last year when we camped the lake, it was very beautiful except for the active forest fire. Dark of the moon and smokey air meant night travel was accomplished by compass and GPS.
We drove nearby to Jackson Lake which was very scenic with a lot less regulations. Thunderstorms occur on both lakes and will test your preparedness.
I agree with Oreana on the restrictive nature of the Yellowstone Regulations. If somebody wanted to combine sailing with driving around the park, I would suggest spending a couple of nights at the dock at Bridge Bay, combined with 2 or more nights at "back country sites out on the lake. The dock space is $20 per night in 2008, and included electrical and water hook-ups. Bridge bay is a good central location for sightseeing around the park, and you can eat out at Lake Lodge or Lake Hotel, or buy hot showers at Fishing Bridge. All are within about 5 miles of Bridge Bay. The biggest complication with day sailing out of Bridge Bay is lowering your mast on the water to enter or exit the marina. But that is something for which our boats are particularly well adapted .
Despite what I wrote, I think that sailing on Yellowstone Lake was a priveledge and a one of a kind experience. If traveling in the area, you must go see this lake. As an example, when motoring back to the marina one morning, we saw geysers erupting along the lake edge, and we turned in to better see. While those on land were restrained well back from any danger, we coasted in to areas not seen by pedestrians. Ghosting along I could see active geysers UNDER my boat. A few minutes later, in a light wind, we came upon a small herd of elk swimming in the lake. We kept quiet and sailed within a few feet of the elk. John S Boise
Hello atwhite2. I have not found a map with water depths, and have been using a Trails Illustrated topo map for Yellowstone Park. I do have Garmin's Inland Lakes Maps loaded into my GPS. This product has what your looking for for Yellowstone Lake and many others around the country. It costs close to 100$ and on my GPS, I can not view the lake depths while still viewing the land topo data. So in reality I rarely switch over and use it while sailing. I can tell you about a few shallow spots to watch out for. Stevenson and Frank Islands have shallows that extend a suprising distance out to the east. On Frank, there is a spit that is just inches below the surface and extends at least 1/4 of a mile out to the east. To the north of this spit is a sheltered bay that ia one of the officialy endorsed anchorages. You could also beach your 26S here,and there is a picnic table and pit toilet there. The South East arm gets very shallow at the southern end by Peale Island. I hope you make it out to Yellowstone, it is one of the prettiest places I have sailed. I hope to get to Jackson Lake next Summer. I had the opportunity to fly over it in a Helicopter this past summer. Beautiful convoluted shoreline, lots of islands, and as John S noted, fewer rules.
Above is a screen shot of Yellowstone using the free chart plotter program SeaClear on my computer. The map shows depth at 20 foot intervals, but by looking at the contour lines you get some idea of what is going on and can see some of the areas Blake is talking about.
You can download the USGS Topo maps free or order hard copies from their site. I have info on my site here...
http://purplesagetradingpost.com/sumner/macgregor-navigation/Navigation Aids-Index.html
....on where they are and also how to convert them for use with SeaClear. I've done a number of western lakes now and it is all free. If you run SeaClear on a computer on the boat and have a $35 GPS puck hooked up to it you can see where you are realtime. You can also plot a course with it and download it to say a handheld GPS like a Garmin 76 or other ones and then use the handheld in the cockpit.
c ya,
Sum
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