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Top Attractions in Great Salt Lake

Antelope Island

Not to be confused with a different Antelope Island on the border of Arizona and Utah in Lake Powell. Antelope Island, with an area of 42 square miles (109 km2), is the largest of 10 islands located within the Great Salt Lake, Utah, United States. The island lies in the southeastern portion of the lake, near Salt Lake City and Davis County, and becomes a peninsula when the lake is at extremely low levels. The first known non-natives to visit the island were John C. Fremont and Kit Carson during exploration of the Great Salt Lake in 1845, who "rode on horseback over salt from the thickness of a wafer to twelve inches" and "were informed by the Indians that there was an abundance of fresh water on it and plenty of antelope". It is said they shot a pronghorn antelope on the island and in gratitude for the meat they named it Antelope Island. Antelope Island has natural scenic beauty and holds populations of pronghorn, bighorn sheep, American bison, porcupine, badger, coyote, bobcat, and millions of waterfowl. The bison were introduced to the island in 1893, and Antelope Island Bison Herd has proven to be a valuable genetic pool for bison breeding and conservation purposes. The bison do well because much of the island is covered by dry, native grassland. The geology of Antelope Island consists mostly of alluvial plains with prairie grassland on the north, east and south of the island, along with a mountainous central area of older Precambrian metamorphic and igneous rocks and late Precambrian to Paleozoic sedimentary rocks, covered by a thin layer of Quaternary lake deposits, colluvium and alluvium. The Precambrian deposits on Antelope Island are some of the oldest rocks in the United States, older even than the Precambrian rocks at the bottom of the Grand Canyon.

Fielding Garr Ranch

The Fielding Garr Ranch is a ranch located on the southeastern portion of Antelope Island State Park in the Great Salt Lake, Utah, United States and is part of the Utah State Parks system. The Fielding Garr Ranch is located at Garr Springs which is one of the strongest and most consistent springs of the 40 known springs on Antelope Island, though even this spring has shown some signs of drying up in recent years. The ranch is one of the oldest working ranching operations in the Western United States. The ranch was initially established in 1848, the year after the first Mormon pioneers came into the Salt Lake Valley. Fielding Garr, a widower with nine children, was sent by the The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to live on Antelope Island and establish a ranch to manage the churchs Tithing Herds of cattle and sheep. The first building was an adobe house, built in 1848, and it is still in existence as the oldest building in Utah, built by pioneers of European descent, that still remains on its original foundation. The adobe ranch house was continuously inhabited thereafter until 1981 when the State of Utah prepared to set up Antelope Island as a Utah State Park. At various times other people tried to live on the island, but the harsh conditions, isolation and a lack of fresh water made it very difficult. The ranch remained under the control of the LDS Church until 1870, when it was purchased by John Dooly, Sr. Dooly lived on the island and set up the Island Improvement Company to provide cattle and sheep ranching. At one point the island supported a population of 10,000 sheep and it was one of the largest sheep ranches in the United States. In 1893, John Dooly and William Glassman imported 12 American bison to the island. Buffalo were becoming extinct over much of their range at the time, and he felt that their novelty value was high enough that he could ranch them, and charge people to hunt them. Ranching continued until 1981, when Antelope Island State Park was established. The cattle and sheep were removed and the island park was created to protect the wildlife and allow park visitors to enjoy the scenic beauty and to camp, boat and visit the beaches of the Great Salt Lake.

Antelope Island bison herd

Antelope Island in Great Salt Lake, Utah, is part of Antelope Island State Park. On the island, a semi–free-ranging population of American bison has been in existence since 1893. Though the island was named for the pronghorn antelope that John C. Frémont and Kit Carson found there when they explored the Great Salt Lake, bison were later introduced and the island is now perhaps most famous for its bison herd. The Antelope Island bison herd is significant because it is one of the largest and oldest publicly owned bison herds in the nation. It is one of the two bison herds managed by the State of Utah, the other being the Henry Mountains bison herd. The Antelope Island bison herd currently numbers between 550 and 700 individuals. Other large free-ranging, publicly controlled herds of bison in the United States include the Yellowstone Park bison herd, the herd in Custer State Park, South Dakota, the Henry Mountains bison herd in south-central Utah, the herd at Wind Cave National Park in South Dakota, and the 400-strong National Bison Range Herd near Flathead Lake, Montana. In addition, though the bison on Antelope Island are Prairie bison, which was the most common bison subspecies in North America, the bison have a distinct genetic heritage from many of the other bison herds in the United States and they are considered to be desirable as part of the breeding and foundation stock for other bison herds, because of their separate genetic heritage and some of the distinct genetic markers that are found in the population. Buffalo watching is one of the most popular activities on Antelope Island. In fact, the island is perhaps best known for the bison that inhabit it, and the bison are generally easily found and observed.

Gunnison Island

Gunnison Island is located in the northwest quadrant of the Great Salt Lake in Box Elder County, Utah, United States , approximately 55 miles northwest of Salt Lake City and about 6 miles east from the lake's western shore. Approximately 1 mile long and 0.5 miles wide, Gunnison Island is best known as an important rookery for the American white pelican (Pelecanus erythrorhynchus). The California gull (Larus californicus) also nests on the island, and occasional nesters include the great blue heron (Ardea herodias), common raven (Corvus corax), prairie falcon (Falco mexicanus), and rock wren (Salpinctes obsoltetus). The entire island is the Gunnison Island State Wildlife Management Area. Access to the island is restricted to prevent curious tourists from disturbing the nesting birds. It is estimated that the population on Gunnison Island (about 10,000) constitutes about 10–20% of the entire American white pelican population; there are also about 15,000 California gulls that nest on the island. Historically, the island's remote location protected it from predators, which made it an ideal spot for ground-nesting birds. However, due to recent low lake levels, it is no longer an island; it is connected to shore by a land bridge which predators can use. The remoteness also forces the pelicans to travel 30 miles (48 km) or more to find fresh water and food. The pelicans typically fly east to the Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge, where the Bear River flows into the Great Salt Lake. In the bird refuge, the water's salinity is low enough that fish can live there. (The Great Salt Lake contains no fish.) The pelicans have also been known to fly south to Utah Lake, about 100 miles (160 km) away. To get to their destinations, large flocks of adult pelicans ride thermals to a great height, then coast down to their destination.

Spiral Jetty

Spiral Jetty is an earthwork sculpture constructed in April 1970 that is considered to be the central work of American sculptor Robert Smithson. Smithson documented the construction of the sculpture in a 32-minute color film also titled Spiral Jetty. Built on the northeastern shore of the Great Salt Lake near Rozel Point in Utah entirely of mud, salt crystals, basalt rocks and water, Spiral Jetty forms a 1,500-foot-long, 15-foot-wide counterclockwise coil jutting from the shore of the lake. The water level of the lake varies with precipitation in the mountains surrounding the area, revealing the jetty in times of drought and submerging it during times of normal precipitation. Originally black basalt rock against ruddy water, Spiral Jetty is now largely white against pink due to salt encrustation. Since the initial construction of Spiral Jetty, those interested in its fate have dealt with questions of proposed changes in land use in the area surrounding the sculpture and of the proper amount of preservation, if any.

Bagley train wreck

The Bagley train wreck (also known as the Great Salt Lake wreck) occurred in Utah, USA on the morning of Sunday December 31, 1944. The crash killed 48 (some sources 50) including over 35 military personnel and injured 79 and involved Southern Pacific's Pacific Limited as it crossed The Great Salt Lake on the Lucin Cutoff. It had left Chicago at 10 a.m. Friday, bound for San Francisco and normally travelled in one long section but on this occasion it was split into two with the passenger train running ahead of the mail express. Early that morning an unusually long and heavy freight train developed problems (unofficially a hot box) whilst travelling west from Ogden. This required the first section of the Pacific Limited which comprised 18 cars headed by SP GS-3 No.4425 to stop and then proceed with caution. The second section, comprising 20 cars headed by SP Mt-4 No.4361 apparently unaware of the problems ahead continued at full speed. At Bagley a siding, 17 miles west of Ogden at 5.14 a.m. in thick fog the mail express plowed into the Pullman car at the back of the passenger train. The Ogden Standard Examiner reported "The force of the impact sent another sleeping car smashing through the dining car and farther ahead slammed one coach into the wooden coach ahead of it. Cars of the mail express section piled up crossways of the track behind the engine, some of them sliding down the causeway embankment into water. Most of the dead were taken from the rear Pullman car and from the telescoped coach" At the site of the crash the tracks run along a causeway across desolate mud and shallow water so all rescue efforts had to come by rail. Fortunately two hospital cars were included in the passenger train manned by members of the Medical Corps and tended the injured until rescue trains arrived from Ogden. The official enquiry into the accident 'found that this accident was caused by failure to properly control the speed of the following train in accordance with signal indications.'
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