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Houseboat Rentals at Jamestown Marina, Lake Cumberland

by Jim
(Louisville, KY)

Rental Houseboats on Lake Cumberland

Rental Houseboats on Lake Cumberland

The houseboats on Cumberland Lake are amazing, and there's so many. We rented one of those 60 footers that had plenty of room for 6 of us. It was fancier than my apartment, and I could seriously consider living on one of these babies...

One of the guys from my hockey team said that we should rent one for a week, and wow, it was a great time. We swam, dove, fished, partied, BBQ'd, and water-skied till we dropped.

Many of the guys are talking about going again, since it was reasonable since we split it 6 ways. Myself, I'm starting to look into buying a small houseboat of my own, since I would spend my summers on it. I'll just have to save some more money, since the one I saw wasn't cheap.

Needless to say, WE LOVED IT!!!



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Reply - Answer


Hi Jim, welcome to the houseboat forums. I'm so glad you guys had a blast as houseboats can be soooo much fun, especially when filled with family/friends.

Like you said, they are a great central platform to do all those activities from. I am sure you guys slept like babies.. :)


Lastly, hopefully some of our readers and visitors will share and post comments about their related houseboat rental experiences and tips.

Feel free to use the "Click here to post comments." link found near the bottom of this page.

Thanks again for sharing, IAN from all-about-houseboats

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Comments for Houseboat Rentals at Jamestown Marina, Lake Cumberland

Average Rating starstarstarstar

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Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Awesome Houseboat Trip
by: Michelle

Our family (5 of us) rented the Deluxe from Jamestown Marina from July 7-11, 2014. We came from Toronto, Ontario and we had the best time! The boats are a little dated but our boat was clean and everything worked fine - especially the air conditioning for comfortable sleeping at night.

The Jamestown staff was awesome! I chose Jamestown after reading reviews from others and I was not disappointed! The staff was very friendly, went above and beyond! We pulled in on our 2nd full day to get gas. Another boat pulled beside us and they were having all kinds of problems with the boat.

The Jamestown staff sent all hands on deck, fixed everything for those people and had them back out on the lake in just over an hour - I was impressed!

Things I would ask Jamestown to change: Give everyone the sheet of paper that the information office has at the top of the hill - it gave points of interest on the lake (such as 76 falls, that was not on our boat map) and distances by water to them.

Secondly the maps on the boat are very vague and difficult to figure out where you are - you need a GPS, once we turned ours on from our iPhone it was sooooo much easier to know exactly where we were on the lake.

Tips: Use a GPS, do NOT run your generator all of the time. We were getting headaches from the gas smell especially while tied up to land. As well the noise is not enjoyable to listen to over the peacefulness of the lake.

We ran ours at night, it takes no time at all to cool the boat off for sleeping. Running both A/C units eats gas like crazy so after the first night we shut the generator off after breakfast then asked everyone to not hold the refrigerator door open.

We used the cooler on the boat deck to hold all drinks. We would then turn the generator on for about an hour mid day then off again until dark. We used only the back A/C unit on low cool and put the front one on med. fan it worked just great the kids needed blankets after a few hours.

Driving the boat is NOT easy, and docking and tying to land each time takes practice and patience! I am glad we went out during the week as the weekends are crazy on the lake - we had plenty of room to get used to driving the boat.

Finding places that have enough land, vs. rock face is tough, it would be good of someone had and provided a map that could show that. With that said be sure to take binoculars so you can scope out places - with some time we found somewhere different each night that provided us a place to make a campfire, good fishing, deep enough at the back end for the kids to use the slide, and shallow enough at the front to wade into the water.

The lake temperature was perfect. I have no complaints about our boat or our experience. We used $500 in gas, we traveled quite a bit Monday and Tuesday and went to the Marina on Wed. and Thurs. (to pick up our seadoo) so we felt that was in the ball park of what we expected.

My kids, all boys 15, 13, & 9 loved it and want to do it next summer! We also rented a yamaha wave runner from Jump and Ski right there next to Jamestown office on the docks. Cathy was awesome, the only problem was that she had only one for us to rent on our last day out and it was an older one and the gas gauge was inaccurate so we couldn't tell how much gas we had - otherwise it worked fine for the kids and they had a blast!

Overall I give them 5 stars, customer service on the phone and once we arrived and returned was top notch! It was an amazing, relaxing and fun vacation and we would absolutely do it again!
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Awesome
by: Linda

Our blended family went from a week in June and it was wonderful. The staff was great there whenever you need them. I was also impressed with the dishes, and pots & pans. I would use them at home. They had everything we needed. It was a wonderful trip and would go again.
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Houseboat Vacations - we LOVE Jamestown
by: Patti

We have been going to Lake Cumberland for all the years I can remember and we have rented boats from ALL of the marinas on the lake, and JAMESTOWN is by far-and-away the best marina on Cumberland, for a couple very important reasons:

1. the best part of the lake (and biggest) is right there, there are sooo many awesome coves.

2. its very convienently placed for road travel (you don't have so many crazy windy back roads)

3. the staff is the absolutely the most friendly gang of people you could ever meet - the manager at boat rental will bend over backwards to help you and she is super friendly and knows EVERYTHING about what will make your individual trip, with your individual needs a blast.

And all of the staff at Jamestown has a genuine care for what you say, they don't just "listen" to you and give you an answer to shut you up, they actually hear what you say (I know, unheard of these days!!)

4. the rental fleet there is the best boat for your money - watch the prices from year to year on the lake. All the other marinas price gouge and increase on an annual basis, as Jamestown is a family resort that rarely increases their prices from one year to the next.

Jamestown Marina people understand that the cost of living is going up yet no ones salaries are (ya know!?).

So when yall are deciding which marina on lake Cumberland to go to, just remember, if you want real people to work with you, if you want to get what you pay for, and you want your individual needs to be cared about - call Jamestown!! They are the best :)

Happy boatin to yall....
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Houseboat Rentals - Jamestown Marina was Fantastic!
by: Mike

My wife and I rented the houseboat on from Jamestown Marina and had a factastic time. The staff at the Marina went out of their way to assist us.

They did a great job of covering the things we needed to know before turning the houseboat over to us and, since it was just my wife and I, even offered to help us tie the boat off is we weren't traveling too far from the marina.

We had no complaints at all about the service at Jamestown. We will rent from them again. The price was right, the boat was in good condition and the staff was fantastic.
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Houseboat Rentals - JAMESTOWN is great
by: Anonymous

I LOVE Jamestown marina...the staff is awesome, the house boats are the BEST bang for your buck out there and Jamestown has an awesome location on the lake it self.

So don't listen to any bad comments you hear about any marinas facilities, because all the rentals fleets are operated the same way...

Those people who wrote about a bad trip at Jamestown and the same thing could and can and DOES happen at State Dock. And guess what, you're out a whole lot more money there then at Jamestown.

YOUR houseboat trip will be what you make it, and in all honesty if you wanna have fun that's up to you, not the houseboat your on.

So for all those people who wrote bad comments about Jamestown Marina, maybe next time you should trying looking in the mirror instead of out the window, and just maybe, if your lucky, life wont pass you by!
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Houseboat Anchoring Suggestions - any places to tie up
by: Mike

We just on a whim have been able to rent a houseboat from Jamestown Marina for the week of September 13th for 4 nights. We have not rented on Lake Cumberland before and I was wondering if someone could offer suggestions for good places to tie up for the time we are there? We would prefer some seclusion. Thanks in advance, Mike
Rating
starstarstarstar 		Lake Cumberland rocks...
by: Joanne

We have been at lake Cumberland before, and we also loved it. The people are nice, the water is clear and warm. I hope that my parents will want to go back soon.
Rating
star 		Jamestown resort houseboat rentals
by: Anonymous

The houseboat was poorly cleaned and was sorely needing to be upgraded, broken trims, missing curtains, mold in cabinets, several cabinets broken, missing light bulbs.

The grill was dirty, broken gas gauge as previously stated do not know if tank was full when left (spent 900 on gas). Hot tub not full and dirty, I could go on and on we felt as though the boat had been poorly maintained.
Rating
star 		Houseboat Rentals - check out the boat thoroughly first
by: Anonymous

We just got back from a Monday - Friday houseboat rental through Jamestown Marina. I would highly suggest you rent from one of the other marinas. The boat had a long laundry list of issues.

They sent us out in the boat with only half full water tanks. We had to go back in and fill up after only 36 hours. The fuel gauge was broken so we really weren't 100% positive we started out with a full tank of gas.

The hot tub was not clean and stunk after one day. We had to pick up sanatizer/treatment for it while we were back for water. Like another poster said, the boat had mold and dead bugs inside and out.

Many of the switches for lights didn't work. We were missing one of our curtain panels which was a problem when trying to cut the sun off of the main room to cool the boat.

The BIGGEST issue was the sanitation system wasn't working properly or it was missing some type of sanatizer. After 36 hours, the rear end of the boat started to smell like a dirty dog kennel. Just disgusting. When we called the dock they said there was nothing they could do about it and they had just sent out their last bottle of sanitizer.

We still managed to have fun but the overall expereince was soured by the issues with the boat. When you pay the type of money you do to rent a houseboat, it should be right!
Rating
star 		Houseboat Rentals - waste of money
by: Anonymous

We rented one of the 77 foot houseboats. It wasn't properly cleaned. There was lots of mold and dead bugs in many areas of the cabin and staterooms. There was human waste down the side of one of the toilets!

The generator kept shutting down, which is very bad when the temps are above 100 degrees. You have no air conditioning without a generator. The waste treatment system was not properly recharged.

In general, it was a very unpleasant experience and I would highly recommend renting elsewhere. Even consider the state dock marina across from Jamestown.

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