Anyone Familiar With Rend Lake (Southern Illlinois)?

[J. Howard]

We go camping every Memorial Day down at Rend Lake and one of our friends trailers his 20-foot bowrider down there for the weekend. We have a great time camping and boating, but our group size and children are growing to the point where the one bowrider is getting stretched pretty thin and Dusty is constantly making runs to keep everyone happy. We'd like to rent a pontoon for the weekend so that some of us could just anchor up in a cove there and then the bowrider could come and go with different loads of people, etc, while those of us who want to can still enjoy the day on/in the water. A lot of us guys in the group are happy just sitting on the boat or swimming, while the kids want to be out going fast, etc. We don't like to take up spots from the kids and would be perfectly happy just hanging out in the water for the day. The local marina there rents pontoons but a full-day rental consists of 8am through 4pm and they do not allow multi-day overnight rentals; the pontoon must be returned by 4pm. I'm trying to figure out a solution to allow us to have a multi-day rental. I think I may start checking on craigslist, but I wondered if anyone who is familiar with the area has any other recommendations for a pontoon rental for the weekend.

Thanks.

 

[four winns 214]

Re: Anyone Familiar With Rend Lake (Southern Illlinois)?

I wish I had a solution for you. It's not just Rend Lake. I've run into similar problems with trying to rent ski boats at different lakes in Kentucky. It's one of the major reasons I ended up buying my own boat-- so I could boat when I wanted to boat.

 

[J. Howard]

Re: Anyone Familiar With Rend Lake (Southern Illlinois)?

Yeah, I wish it was more feasible for me to just take my boat down there because it would be perfect to anchor up for the day. But as of right now, I don't even own a trailer for it. I slip it for the summer and pay for winter storage because I live in a condo in the city and don't have anywhere to store a trailer (let alone a boat). It won't be long before we move out to the 'burbs and one of my main criteria will be either a large enough garage or a good spot in the yard for boat/trailer storage.