Paddling Lake Pleasant - Part 1

Today, February 27, 2019, was what we waited for -- perfect paddling conditions:  74F temperature, a breeze of 4mph or less, and bright, sunny skies!  We had our choice of places to explore around Lake Pleasant, and decided to start at the north end because of the large number of coves and islands -- and because we had seen some of the terrain yesterday when we hiked the local trails.

We picked a gently sloped, fine gravel beach in Fireman's Cove to put in.  Here, our Jeep Dusty sits patiently while we prepare for our paddle.  A few other campers are boondocking on this section of the shoreline, but they're busy with their own activities:

The water, while cold, was welcoming the moment we slipped into the lake, as you can see from this video of the start of our paddle on Lake Pleasant.

Working our way south along the western shoreline, we immediately saw a wide variety of volcanic rocks:

Our first stop was Cottonwood Creek.  Here, Kathy leads the way up to the furthest shallows of the creek:

Back out at the mouth of Cottonwood Creek, we encountered "No Wake" buoys at the inlet between Helm's Island and Yavapai Point:

Paddling south around Yavapai Point, which we had climbed yesterday for panoramic views of Lake Pleasant, we worked our way into Pipeline Cove and up Pipeline Creek toward a bridge that had marked the turnaround point for our hike of the day before.  Today, it had a few hikers and a couple dogs standing and peering our way out into the lake:

We put our kayaks ashore near the bridge, to have our lunch and enjoy the greens, reds and blues of the day:

In our blog entry of yesterday, "Hike to Yavapai Point," we have a photo of Kathy dipping her hot tootsies into the cold waters of the lake.  We had her reenact her cool intermission for a camera viewing from the water rather than the land:

Putting back out into the water, we started paddling out Pipeline Creek, looking for interesting views such as this hillside of what appeared to be thousands of ancestors gazing down upon us with approval:

One arm of Pipeline Creek stretches up the canyon and steadily narrows, but remains deep enough for us to paddle some distance.  Here, we ran across a dead tree still standing in the canyon water:

Another dead tree graced the shoreline:

Another arm of Pipeline Creek extended even further up inland from Yavapai Point:

Kathy explored the arm as far as the water would let her kayak float:

Back out on the main water of the lake, we got more expansive view of rocks, cactus and the expansive green carpets of vegetation exploding from the extraordinary rains this area has received this winter:

Across the lake, a lone sailboat plied its way, tacking in the light winds:

We turned a final point before paddling past a few small islands to return to Fireman's Cove:

One fellow was fishing from his own kayak, hopefully safe from the wakes of motorboats within the protection of warning buoys:

Looking south from our place, floating among small island, we could see ghostly mountains in the distance, measuring the large vistas across the lake:

We slowly found our way back to our origin -- about 5 miles of paddling in all -- only to find this cheeky raven taking possession of our Jeep.  Kathy tried splashing her paddle to drive him away.  He did flee reluctantly, but only after leaving his "calling card" on the roof of the Jeep.  Thanks, buddy.

This was hopefully but the first of two days of paddles on Lake Pleasant.  Tomorrow, we'll show you what we find on the south end of the lake.