Lake Wind, Lake Weekends, Absent Owners
What Lake Travis Does to a Hudson Bend Pool
Ask three neighbors on Hudson Bend Road where their water comes from and you may get three answers. Most of the peninsula gets treated Lake Travis water from small local utilities, moderately hard. Some older lots still run on private wells. Apache Shores fills from WCID 17 surface water. None of that is a problem until a pool company assumes every pool starts the same. Lake water starts moderately hard and climbs as 50-plus inches of yearly evaporation concentrates it. Well water usually starts harder. So on a new pool here we test the fill line first, not just the pool.
That first reading sets the program. On lake-water pools we keep pH between 7.4 and 7.6, alkalinity between 80 and 120 ppm, and the saturation index near zero, and we watch calcium climb toward the point where a cool-month partial drain makes sense. Well fill means managing hardness from day one. Infinity edges, common on new lakefront builds, add two things: the sheet spilling over the edge aerates constantly and drives pH up, and it evaporates faster than still water, so the autofill quietly adds calcium all summer. Acid on a schedule handles the first. Tracking calcium handles the second.
Then the lake itself. Hudson Bend sticks out into Lake Travis below Mansfield Dam, and the wind that makes good sailing at the yacht club drops cedar duff, oak leaves, and dust into every pool on the peninsula, all week. Lots are steep, so the pad is often a flight of stairs from the water, and 1970s to 1990s lake houses on original pumps and DE filters sit beside new builds with variable-speed pumps and automation. Add boats, guests, sunscreen, and 95°F weekends from June through September, and a pool that was perfect Thursday can be cloudy by Sunday night.
