Trip Report: Paddling at Bear Lake (canoe, SUP, kayak, etc.)
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Paddling at Bear Lake (canoe, SUP, kayak, etc.) By Katherine Thom |
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| BOATING | 06/05/2026 | Class I |
| Bear Lake Trip Report Participants: Chris Peele and Katherine Thom, report by Katherine Thom A river paddle trip had been on the calendar for this particular weekend for at least 6 months. First we switched rivers and then we ended up nowhere near the flow rate we needed to have a good time. So, we pivoted to a lake experience! Understandably, folks had already made plans or just didn't think paddling on such a big lake would be worthwhile, but it was pretty great with our petite party of 2. I reserved a campground spot on the east side just below the Idaho border. We had a bit of a hike to get our boats from the campground to the water. They consisted of one hard-sided 10 foot kayak and a 12 foot plus inflatable drop stitch kayak. Friday afternoon we had almost no wind and blue skies so we paddled 2 miles RT staying close to shore as we headed south from camp. We spotted an island full of large birds, maybe pelicans, in the distance. In the evening we used the firewood our campground had available and made a nice campfire for watching the sunset and making s'mores. Being conscientious boaters, we had our invasive species education for Utah for 2016. However, we were right on the border with Idaho and wondered if we needed their special permit stickers to be on their waters. We were right and wrong because we could be on the Idaho side of the lake without stickers as long as we were launching from Utah. Ha! Thus, we made a plan to paddle north along the shore. We checked the weather carefully and noted a big uptick in winds for the afternoon. With that in mind, we set out reasonably early and headed into Idaho. The water was very shallow in this section so we had to pick our exit carefully for a brief pitstop at a day use area. There were a ton of folks playing on the water and sunning on the beach but the area we were in had very little motorized boat traffic. Around this time we started spotting fish. Lots of them. They were very large Bear Lake and Bonneville Whitefish who liked to hang out in the shallows. We watched them for a long time and tried to corral them with our boats. Around this time we looked at the clock and noticed we were getting close to "wind time." We got about halfway back when it picked up pretty good. Chris fared better in her hard sided boat but I had to zig and zag a bit to make forward progress. By the time we got back to our beach following a 6.5 mile RT paddle, there were small white caps developing. It got way worse after that so we were glad we turned around when we did. It was still a great outing and we had huckleberry ice cream from a food truck located in our campground! After relaxing the rest of the afternoon we went birdwatching around camp and made another fire with more s'mores. We said our goodbyes in the morning after reflecting on a very relaxing weekend on the water. |
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