Ultimate Utah fishing boat.

[dubob]

Lots of advice here, some of it bad, dumb, and indifferent.  Amen!  

I've owned a number of boats in my time, and spend probably 60 days a year trolling in Utah and in Washington on the Columbia: I'm more in the 30 to 40 days a year just trolling in Utah, Wyoming, & Idaho.

To advise anything but Max rated horsepower is stupid.  You and I get it; he doesn't and never will.  Did you also note that he hasn't figured out that the electric trolling motors can be used for steering the boat while trolling as well as for working a shoreline while casting?  Or spot locking a boat over a submerged structure for jigging as in Lake Trout fishing?   Full stop. We live at high elevation, where you lose 3% horsepower for every thousand feet of elevation. At Strawberry, you're only operating with about 75% of your rated horsepower. Plenty of guys who tried to cut corners and cost on the motor, get to strawberry and can't hardly plane with two or three people. Dumb.

As for Midwest style boats, Lund and Crestliner. Tracker is junk, cheap for a reason.  Sorry, respectfully have to disagree with your assessment of Tracker as being junk.  I ran my 16 ft Targa, Deep-V here in Utah for 11 years.  Never had anything break or need repair other than one engine tune-up (Merc Optimax 75) at year 9.  Inexpensive, yes; cheap, not IMHO.  For the price range, it is the best choice on the market.  If your budget is in that price range, they will give the owner years of good service.

As for professional style boats: Duckworth, North River, Alumaweld, etc. I currently have a 20' Duckworth and love it.  And my ThunderJet is awesome as well.  

As for motors: I'm partial to Mercury, but it's hard to go wrong these days.  Yep!  The best advice on motors is to go with whatever brand has a dealer with trained maintenance technicians near your home location.  I use Fred's Marine in Layton for work on my 2 Mercs with excellent results.

Troutster, let us know what you decide.  You have plenty of information now to make a somewhat informed decision.  Good luck in your pursuit of the 'Ultimate Fishing Boat'.