LAKE MURRAY STATE PARK, Okla. (KFOR) – The golden hour in mid-winter is that short period just before the sun comes up.

For James Thompson, the solitude of darkness still holds before the workday.

“I’ve got the lake, literally, to myself,” he smiles.

A cup of coffee and a little quiet time are enough to carry him through most days, but for the past two decades he’s had the perfect spot to re-charge, a little property he took over in 1999 with the idea of starting up a houseboat cruise business.

Instead, he turned it into the Lake Murray Floating Cabins.

“That’s where the concept came together,” he recalls. “We needed a cabin, a floating cabin on the water, instead of trying to manage in a houseboat.”

There are 21 cabins sitting on the water near the state park.

During summer, at peak times, all of them stay rented.

There are boats pulled up and fishing poles in the water.

Winter is very different.

Geese are the only horns honking in January.

Thompson says, “When you wake up in the morning and hear the geese sounding off, landing in the water next to your cabin, it is pretty amazing.”

Anglers familiar with this lake might remember the old Donut Hole indoor fishing platform from a generation ago.

Thompson turned it into what he calls the Atrium Lodge.

“Four bedrooms, five bathrooms, full kitchen,” he shows us. “It’s just like being at home.”

The dining room sits right where the hole in the floor used to be.

“Yeah. It’s closed now,” he laughs.

Thompson’s day starts at 8 o’clock.

Out on the water he’s a world away, floating in silence, alone with his thoughts, and still with plenty of space to let for anyone else who’d like to do the same.

“It’s one of the prettiest times here,” he sums up.

For more information on the Lake Murray Floating Cabins, including reservations, go to www.lakemurrayfloatingcabins or their Facebook page at www.facebook.com/floatingcabins.