Welcome to beautiful Emerald Cove in Arizona! This cove is brilliantly green and looks like a scene from a fairy tale!
Emerald Cove is located about an hour and a half from Las Vegas, NV, although it is in AZ! It is located in the Black Canyon on Lake Mead. Lake Mead is the largest reservoir in the United States in terms of water capacity, and homes the Hoover Dam.
The cool thing about Emerald Cove is that is is a beautiful place to visit that can be worked into a vacation in many different ways. You can camp at Lake Mead for a weekend or you could add a day onto your Las Vegas trip or Grand Canyon trip and travel down to see Emerald Cove. I would recommend a full day to go see Emerald Cove though because you can only access it by water. This means you will have to paddle board, kayak, canoe, raft, or boat into it.
One of the best place to start your Emerald Cove journey is at Willow Beach. At this point, it will be about two miles trip to Emerald Cove, and two miles back. This is the shortest distance to Emerald Cove.
The most important thing to remember when visiting Emerald Cove is you must go at the right time if you want to see the green waters! The waters are not green due to algae. The waters appear to be green because the sun reflects off the yellow brown lake floor and creates a green effect. This also means you need to plan this trip on a clear day. If it is cloudy or overcast, the sun will not be able to reflect off the lake floor, and there will be no green. The best time to see Emerald Cove is from noon to three on a clear day.
I have been telling my husband we need to go back to Vegas for a weekend trip and now I am definitely thinking I want to extend it an extra day so I can go and paddle board into Emerald Cove!
Let me know if you’ve ever been to Emerald Cove and what tips you have!