Jenkinsville, SC
The grounds · Lake history
There are no houses on the far shore and no marina lights after dark. Mornings are quiet, the water is usually flat, and on a clear night you can see the Milky Way.
The peninsula itself
The domes sit on a private peninsula with water on three sides and a gravel road on the fourth. There are two domes on thirty-three acres and nothing else out here, so it stays quiet.
A local farmer still cuts hay in the field behind the domes. Walk out into it at dusk and you can see the lake on both sides.
After dark
Nobody can build on the shoreline, so at night there is nothing on it to light up. There are no houses across the water and no town close enough to brighten the horizon.
That is what makes the skylight over each bed worth having. On a clear night you can see the Milky Way from the deck, and the telescope in the Big Dipper gets plenty of use.
Why the water is flat
Motorized sport is not permitted on the lake, so there are no jet skis and no water skiing. With almost nothing crossing its 6,700 acres, the lake is glass-flat most mornings, the way it looks in the sunrise photos on this site.
The pumps that move water between the lake and the Broad River raise and lower the level by a foot or two over the day. You will not notice it on the dock, but leave some slack if you tie up a boat.
For anglers
Lake Monticello is one of the few lakes in South Carolina where you can reliably catch smallmouth bass. Because water is pumped back and forth with the Broad River, the lower end stays warmer through the winter, and people fish it in January and do well.
There are also largemouth bass, crappie, striped bass and several kinds of catfish, and the lake hosts fishing tournaments.
A bit of history
Lake Monticello was created in the late 1970s to hold cooling water for the power station next door. That is why it has so many fingers and inlets instead of one long, open basin.
The utility kept all 54 miles of shoreline and has never sold any of it. So there are no docks lining the lake, no restaurants and no marina, and nothing on the shore to light up the sky at night.
Two geodesic domes, a skylight over each bed, and nothing in the way of the sky.