We put the Boulder Bay Chalet together so that people can have a great and relaxing time. I want people to smile and relax. So often people forget to take time out for both.

Big Bear Lake visitors primarily come from southern California; as is to be expected. When family visits they often congregate in the coolness of a waterfront retreat. But for the most part it is just local friends and families that want to make the trip up the mountain to Big Bear Lake. I am sure the majority of people who don't choose Big Bear Lake when thinking of a mountain retreat don't know how much it has changed in the last twenty years.

When my family lived in Lake Arrowhead, around 1988, the only time we would go to Big Bear Lake was if a visitor wanted to see it. It was pretty run down at that time. Twenty or so year later, after we had relocated 150 miles away, when we found out our time share had a resort there we tried it again. This time it was not so bad. They were in the mist of renovating and modernizing the town. Someone had started thinking about town revenue and they were doing something about it.

Every time we were up there we looked at lake front homes just for something to do. As we did so we realized no one had everything people needed when they visited. They might have this but they were missing that. So when an opportunity came along we bought a relatively new lakefront home in the most convent (and prettiest in our opinion) location for people to get to. Because we were semi retired we had the time to assemble the house in to a rental that everyone would love.

The neatest thing was that everyone in our family and all of our friends had something to contribute. The sailboat from my father; china from my mother; crystal from my husbands mother, kayaks from one of our kids and the list goes on. We had to buy the Pontoon Boat to complete the amenities.

Even though the water district says we have the most watercraft of any rental on Big Bear Lake we are going to add a peddleboat in the spring of 2011. We almost added a windsurf board (because of the wonderful 4 pm wind) but it didn't seem worth the $90 registration fee since we were not really sure anyone would use it. Almost every group uses the 2 kayaks and 2 canoes. In the spring and summer of 2009 almost all of the 23 groups that rented the Boulder Bay Chalet used the Sunfish sailboat.

Knowing people are using the 'toys' we made available makes it all worthwhile. You can't get out on the water on a canoe, kayak or sail boat with out smiling. It just feels toooooo good. Stress runs out and joy fills the cockles of your heart, soul and mind. Even now, when I'm at home working 80 hours a week (yes we went back to work in this economy) my computer screen always reminds me to relax and think of rowing on the lake.