Utah site: Antelope Island

Over the years, Brodi and I have had a great chance to live in some cool cities. The benefit of living in interesting cities is that you get visitors and you get to go out and see things that you may not go to if you just lived there. London, DC and Denver all had some good tourist sites and fun things to do.

Salt Lake City is a pretty cool city...but since we live here and we haven't had a lot of people come and visit us here, we often don't go and check out new things. Well, that is changing baby! I want to find some hidden gems and some not-so-hidden gems and go and see these sites. It started this weekend with Antelope Island. I have seen this island every single day of my Utah life, yet I had not visited it.



We made the drive out there (exit 332, Syracuse) this past weekend. It costs $9 to get your car and off you go. A couple of facts about the island: Its home to around 600 bison (several of which we saw and one of them is pictured on the right). The island is over 28,000 acres and is surrounded by the Great Salt Lake. The are actually many smaller islands (I believe 10 of them) that are all around Antelope Island, but Antelope Island is the biggest and the only one with true access. The roads on the island are very nice and well maintained.






So, what to do? We got there and took a little bike ride all around. This was difficult because Beckham still is not too sure how much he wants to ride a bike. He looked stylish with his helmet on, but he wanted me to push him or he simply wanted to watch Carter ride around. Carter is becoming a biking pro.








The visitors center is pretty cool with all the information on the age of the rocks on the island (millions of years old) to the wildlife (bison, deer fawn, birds, etc.) and there is an exciting movie. They have a gift shop there as well and they keep it well maintained. It also has some nice views of the motorway to get out to the island and some of the beaches.










Probably the best option on the island is the hiking. We were able to do some pretty cool exploring. It is very desert like with few, if any, trees. There are some good high points on the island as well for nice views over Davis County. You also get the chance to see some of the bison and deer fawn hanging out grazing.







We did not do the swimming as the bugs were out in full force. You can see the Great Salt Lake water is receding a bit as the shores when out quite a bit until you get to water (the view on the left is one of the beaches, so you can see that the beach line goes out quite a distance to finally get to the salty water). There are many salt fields all around, but the actual Antelope Island is surrounded by water but as you go across the water closer to Davis County, you run into the salt fields.






We spent about 3-4 hours there, but if I had planned better, you easily can spend a day with hiking, biking and swimming out there. We were hungry and had to stop at the closest McDonalds for the boys to play and eat.

So, any suggestions for me on where to visit next? I have some ideas, but have you gone anywhere in the Salt Lake area that we need to try out. Give me some ideas.