Getting away from it all on a Houseboat

[Michigan Mike]

I'm daydreaming again about retireing on a houseboat. I've been Googling the J. Percy Priest Lake area near Nashville, TN. It looks like it has a lot to offer ... warm climate, lots of water, wooded shoreline ... and still within biking distance of a big town. If anyone has ever done any boating on this lake I'd love to hear some of the pro's and con's.
.

[skyl4rk]

I hear yah, I want one too.

[Michigan Mike]

That's what I'm talking about!
.

[Kevlarr]

There was a guy about 20 years ago that built a houseboat/trailer here in Lansing. They even did an article on him in Michigan Living and in the Lansing State Journal. Basically he put a 28' camping trailer on a custom aluminum hull that still had trailer wheels that he could retract up above the waterline. He built it to tow and if he found a lake or a river he wanted to explore he'd just drop it in at a boat launch and go. As I recall he did a couple of big trips down the Missouri and Mississippi with it too. Used to see it sitting in his driveway back when I worked close to his house.

[Michigan Mike]

Great idea. I heard something similar ... that some of the big lakes and impoundments out west have pontoon boats that you can just back your camper trailer onto. There are wheel wells for the campers wheels.

.

[Kevlarr]

My parents were big into MH camping when I was a kid in the 70's and I remember reading the old issues of Camping Life where they had something like what you're talking about. Even had provisions for the drive wheels to power the propeller or something.

There was even one deal where they would strap your camper to a flatbed rail car for these long tours out west. Never really understood how that worked because you stayed in your camper on the train.