Matt, we did ours exactly like you described with the planks. BTW, what is the wall pattern on your pool called? It looks almost exactly like ours....Mystic Palm it was called.

Beautiful yard - how do you mow all that? Must have a yard tractor with mower? We live out in the country too, but have a lot more woods surrounding everything - we popped our pool back into a nice protected spot only open to the west, but not too much (house is maybe 75' to the west) We get some STRONG N and S winds sometimes - but rarely feel more than a breeze at the pool.

Your solar reel was our inspiration for building ours. Nothing mounted to the rails of the pool, nothing to lift off and put somewhere else.