Hub of the Grand Circle.

• Position: Utah Travel Council designates border town of Page, Arizona as 'gateway to Utah' due to its large contribution to and heavy promotion of Utah tourism

For Utahns, Glen Canyon Dam, Lake Powell and its nearby Wahweap Marina are the most notable assets of Page, the thriving border town located just 14 miles over the Arizona border.

But Page is so much a factor in southern Utah's tourism industry, that the Utah Travel Council has designated this town of 7,000 people as a "gateway to Utah." Page was built only 35 years ago by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation to house the hundreds of workers building the Glen Canyon Dam over the Colorado River. When the dam was completed in 1963, it created the second-largest man-made lake in North America: Lake Powell, with 2,000 miles of shoreline.

As tourism promoters in both states have recognized, Page is the hub of the Grand Circle, America's largest concentration of national parks and monuments, with 14 in all. It sits on the main route connecting the Grand Canyon, Zion, Bryce, Monument Valley, Four Corners, Mesa Verde, and other historic and scenic landmarks.

Three million visitors came to Page during 1991, mostly from California and Arizona. "We send a lot of travelers to Utah and hand out all of the Utah Travel Council's brochures," said Joan Staveley, executive director of the Page-Lake Powell Chamber of Commerce.

Staveley is one of several native Utahns who now live, work, and own businesses in Page. She hails from the southeastern Utah town of Mexican Hat on the San Juan River. Her father established one of the first commercial river-running companies back in the 1930s. Before joining the Chamber of Commerce, she worked as sales manager for the Del E. Webb real estate company, former owners of all the marinas on Lake Powell, including Wahweap, the largest.

A Boat with a View

Del E. Webb sold its Lake Powell properties to ARA Leisure Services in 1989. ARA is a world leader in the concession business. At Lake Powell, ARA employs 500 people, a number that mushrooms to 1,000 between May and mid-October, when all 700 motel rooms in Page are booked every night of the week. Developers are building more motels, but last year Page innkeepers referred travelers to Kanab, Utah, 75 miles to the west.

Seventy-five percent of all visitors to the Page-Lake Powell area go to Wahweap, a 350-room hotel resort with marina, restaurants, and 120 of the ever-popular houseboats for rent. "Not every lake has houseboats," explains Steve Ward, director of public relations for Wahweap. "Lake Powell is so big and there are so many places to explore, that most people stay four...