Antelope Island State Park

About this place

Antelope Island is the largest of the ten islands in Utah's Great Salt Lake, covering about 109 square kilometres in the south-eastern part of the lake, about 35 km in a straight line north-west of Salt Lake City. It is protected as a state park and becomes a peninsula when the lake level is very low. The first known non-native visitors were the explorers John C. Frémont and Kit Carson in 1845, who rode horses across the salt and were told by Native people that the island had fresh water and plenty of pronghorn antelope, hence its name. Bison were introduced in 1893, and the island's herd has become an important genetic pool for bison breeding and conservation. A paved road runs along a long causeway over the shallow blue lake to the island, where golden grassy hills, sagebrush and ancient rocks stretch down to white shores. Herds of bison, pronghorn and bighorn sheep graze here, millions of waterbirds stop on the shores, and the hilltops look out over the lake and distant mountains. A vehicle entry fee applies. Bison are huge wild animals, so keep well away from them; biting insects are common on the shore in early summer, and the lake is so salty that swimmers float easily.