Antelope Island State Park - Utah

 

Several equestrians had recommended Antelope State Park as a great place to camp and ride with horses. There are only two campsites available for equestrians on the entire island. The island resides in the middle of the Great Salt Lake in Utah. You reach it by driving over a causeway and a bridge.

The landscape on the island is rather sparse. The island is about the same size as Catalina Island - and it boasts  it's own herd of buffalo.

"Twelve bison, 4 bulls (males), 4 cows (females) and 4 calves were taken by boat to the island on February 15, 1893, by William Glassman and John Dooly." These 12 animals apparently came originally from a small private herd in Texas and became the foundation for what has grown into the Antelope Island bison herd.

At this point, it appears that there are a couple hundred bison on the island.

Our campground was the White Rock Campground and we rode the White Rock trail - which basically takes you around the southwest end of the island. Horses are not allowed on the beaches.

Bison would slowly and nonchalantly walk through and by our campsite. They weren't destructive. They were pretty calm. They didn't appear to be afraid of people  nor were they that interested in people.

This is our campsite. No water or electricity is available at the campsites and we had no cell service.

We had a nice picnic table with a shade.

A corral was provided, but we set up the portable corral as well so we could separate the horses. My horse got the camp corral and Lennox got the portable corral.

This is a short video of how Lennox reacted every time a bison showed up at our campsite. He was extremely noisy and agitated about the interloper.

I had been warned that the mosquitoes and flies on the island were something awful and that September/October were the best months to visit the island. 

Well, we can attest to the awfulness of the insects. We used OFF. Skin So Soft, AND Equine Fly Spray and we were still covered in bugs. Fly sheets were put over both horses to protect them from the insects. 

Between the lack of internet and suffering insect bites pretty much everywhere on his body, Ari was not a happy camper. I liked the quiet and the barren beauty of the island, but I agreed with Ari that the bugs pretty much ruined the experience.

We were in the process of packing up to move on to our next place when we met a couple of equestrians who had come onto the island for a day ride. They recommended we check out North Fork County Park, so we decided to head there.

Antelope Island State Park did have a dump station for RVs, so we stopped at the dump station before we left the island.

The park is located fairly close to Wasatch View Ranch. If we had known it was an option, we would have skipped Wasatch View Ranch and stayed at the park.

We are boondocking at the park. The camp host hasn't shown up to the camp host site, so we have no idea if we are OK or not. The horses are in a couple of corrals next to us.