I had heard some of the guys at work that fish Fontana talk about the houseboats. The concept was something I still don't understand. Fontana Lake is a Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) project and apparently people were allowed to construct non-navigable houseboats on the lake and discharge their raw sewage and grey water directly into the lake under their houseboats - unregulated. This was allowed for years and years - with estimates of 10,000-30,000 gallons of waste PER DAY being discharged during peak season usage.

Finally, a very few years ago people and government agencies woke up and decided this problem needed to be addressed. Now houseboats are required to have holding tanks that have to be pumped periodically. I don't know how seriously this is enforced. To me, these houseboats look like slum areas and are an eyesore on this otherwise beautiful lake.