"BEST" Lakes in the West

[Kurtis500]

Best lake in the west? Hands down, its FIREBIRD!!

[Cas]

hurley,
The book you are referring to is also a good book. Personally, i like all of Tom Steinstra's books, he does a great job with all his descriptions.
The book Sherpa is referring to can possibly be found at a lot of different stores like Walmart, Rite Aid, OSH and many others. I've even seen them at some 7-11's.
Happy Holidays!

[gnarley]

Since no one posted anything about Clear Lake I copied what I posted from the info on worst lakes in the Sandbar because a few had asked about it. Clear Lake is by no means a bad lake, in fact it is quite nice & very large!
We went to Clear Lake 5 times last year, it’s a big lake. From late spring till early August it's great. The lakes average depth is about 15 feet and is the largest natural lake in California dating back to pre-historic times. There’s a lot of history up there dating back to the mid 1800's. It can get rough in the afternoon if the wind comes up and the water temperature is in the high 70's to around 80 degrees in the summer time.
Due to the shallow depth and high water temperature it gets a lot of algae & anytime after August the lake can look green in some places! You can always see little algae spores in the water. There isn't much for shoreline hanging out that I have seen to date but there are several bars and restaurants around the lake, namely Konocti Harbor resort and spa. Konocti is a very big full service resort with marina, boat rentals, docks, restaurants, 2 or 3 bars, 2 Natural Olympic sized spring fed pools that stay around 84 degrees and a full service spa. Oh I forgot to mention the concert venue that overlooks the water. You can hang out below the concerts and listen for free to lots of big name acts!
Clear Lake is a very cool place but I don't want to swim in the water after August and Clear Lake is one of the top trophy bass lakes in California and saw it on the Bass Masters tour on TV about 3 weeks ago.

[oldphart]

Camp far west is great up till about the 4th of July, then it gets too muddy and warm, Englebright is deep & clean just not a lot of camping, Oroville is large and great if the wind isnt blowing 3' waves if it is. The afterbay is pretty good all year round. Bullards bar is a very good unknown lake. Clear lake is any thing but. Think of boating in a large septic tank with huge fields of some kind of sea weed that smells like 10000 fish died 2 weeks ago. Theres Almanor and of course the sacramento river from redding south. Lots of great boating up here in the north land

[Cas]

oldphart,
Clear Lake isn't quite THAT bad If I remember right, it's pretty good for a few weeks in the late Spring.

[hurleyr]

Just wanted to thank you all for the input. We'll have no problem setting up the boat trips this summer.

[gnarley]

Originally posted by Cas
oldphart,
Clear Lake isn't quite THAT bad If I remember right, it's pretty good for a few weeks in the late Spring.
Cas, I'd say your pretty close. I'd go as far as mid summer then forget Clear Lake and go to Berryessa or the Delta