Great Salt Lake

Great salt lake is big - 1700 square miles, max width (east to west) 28 miles, max length (south to north) 75 miles. An interesting fact is that the lake is endorheic, i.e. it has no outlet,  the water leaves the lake through evaporation. 

Last Sunday (November 10th)  I visited the Great Salt Lake with a colleague from Singapore, before attending a technical conference at the convention center of salt lake city. We visited the lake through the antelope island that afternoon. It is interesting to note that the lake is so big, it is more than 6 times the area of Singapore (278.7 square miles)!

It was a beautiful day at the lake - clear blue sky with white clouds passing now and then. We arrived at antelope island around 1 pm local time through a connecting road (the white line in the above map at the northern tip of the island). The white rock bay on the west side of the island was chosen as our first stop since we could view the full lake from there.

The "dam" road divides Farmington bay from the main lake. The scene from the road  was very beautiful - snow covered mountain ranges in the east and west under the blue sky, whitish beach and brownish bushes, but the salt flat was soft and smelly! due to dead birds, rotten plants ... on the beach, and the endorheic nature of the lake.

 Farmington Bay

on salt flat

The access point to the white rock bay is at the end of a gravel road on the west side of the island. A sand dune and bushes separated the beach and lake from the main land.

Looking to the west - the lake is right in the front, a wide grayish beach separated the water from the land, a line of dead stumps extended from land to the water's edge,  a small island - the white rock - near the shore, a veil of mist over the water in the distance, mountains behind the west shore. No people in sight.

Looking north - there is no end of the lake, a veil of mist in the horizon.

It is an alien landscape - deserted, exotic and mystical.

the white rock in back light

Looking to the south - a barren hill - with bright brownish rocks and soils. I heard voice from the slope, there were people hiking. In fact many people, likely to be locals, came here for hiking and mountain biking.  Our goal, however, is the lake.

There were scattered footprints, and a couple of bike tire prints on the beach. There were a few small puddles on the salt flat/beach, and as water evaporated, some puddles have salt crystals in them.

It turns out that one can hike to the white rocks during a average season like this year. A ligament of the raised land connected the beach to the white rocks.

salt crystal

water's edge

panorama  view of beach and part of the lake

The views from the top of the rocks  - southeast - the mountains on the island - which blocked the view of salt lake city, and far away snow peaked mountains; east  - the beach and a small snail shaped formation in the water, southwest - veil of vapors. We stayed on the rocks for ~ 30 minutes.

southeast of the lake

top of the white rock - looking to the east

looking south from white rocks

The antelope island is big by itself, the largest island in great salt lake  - 15 miles long (south-north) and 4.8 miles wide (east - west). We went to the east side of the island late in the afternoon.

Our original plan was to reach the southern tip of the island - the unicorn point, and look at Salt lake city downtown. It was getting dark when we reached the trail head. The unicorn point is 4.6 miles away. We abandoned the plan to go to unicorn point.

The sun was setting, bison were roaming on the hill side. The sky turned golden.

The island and the lake have a totally different look - the changing color and the changing look of the landscape was mesmerizing!  The great salt lake is even more mystical and exotic at dusk.

bison by the an

antelope island in the dusk

two bison in the grass land under a rising moon

dusk at great salt lake