The change in landscape between Nevada and Utah was amazing to me. It didn't happen gradually, but immediately upon entering Utah, the white salt was evident. Carl and I were amazed by the mirage effect, making parts of the land to appear to be floating. The mountains were beautiful, too.
The next day, after weighing our choices, we decided to drive to Antelope Island State Park, an island in the Great Salt Lake, with a causeway to the island. As we drove up to it, we were so excited, because it was beautiful. We were swayed by the travel brochure, and were excited to see the lake, play in the sand, potentially even get our feet wet. We also thought we'd do a short little hike to a high point and check out the view.
It was defintiely beautiful.
We got out of the car at the visitor's center, and almost immediately were swarmed by tiny little flies. Even after getting inside, it took a long time to not be itchy from the little flies, as they got into our hair and crawled on our skin. They didn't really bite, but it burned and itched anyway. Inside the neat visitor center, we learned they were brine flies.
We enjoyed learning about the lake, and then headed back out to the car. The flies swarmed again. In the car, we scratched and flicked and squished the flies, then headed out to the beach. At this point, we were still hopeful that they were, for some reason, just gathered around the visitor center.
This proved to be overly optimistic. We got out at the beach, and, again, were swarmed. However, we did find that the picnic shelter was relatively fly-free, and we enjoyed a nice picnic lunch. Anders ate quickly and then went out to the sand.
The lake was really far out. A dry year? Way more than a year of dryness? I'm not sure.
Carl tried walking all the way out to the water. He was fine at first, but after a time he started to be swarmed again. He gave up on getting to the water, and turned back. By then he was swarmed again. He decided to try to give them the slip by going into the bathroom until his skin stopped burning.
I went back to the picnic area where Erik was finishing lunch, then off to the bathroom. I, too, was now feeling the flies. When I got back again to the picnic area, our peaceful retreat was calm no longer. There were a few tortilla chips left in the bag, along with thousands of the flies. Enough to make the contents look black.
Carl's opinion
We decided to get back in the car. No one was enjoying being out anymore.
I was still hopeful that the short hike would be a possibility. Maybe the flies liked the lower areas, closer to the water. This point would be higher, and maybe without brine flies?
I volunteered to get out of the van first and test the air. The flies, if this is even possible, were even more numerous. I ran ahead a bit, to see if that was just in the parking lot area. I almost stepped on this
And it was clear that there was no relief from the flies. I snapped some quick pictures of the rest of the family in safety, along with a little of the view, and hopped back in the car to itch and try to get rid of the flies all over my exposed skin, and particularly in my hair.
We still wanted to see the bison, but there was no way anyone was getting out of the car. So we were able to see this much:
for context
I didn't even open the windows. The view was still breathtaking.
As we drove away, Erik's comment was, "Well, now we know what the plague of flies was like." We all agreed it was miserable.
That afternoon, CeeCee needed to take a nap in the hotel room, and the boys needed something else to do so that CeeCee could take a nap. I decided to take them to the Natural History Museum. We enjoyed it a lot, especially enjoying the lack of flies.
Inside a fossil footprint of a dinosaur
A puppet show
After another nice night at the hotel, our time in Salt Lake came to a close, and we left the next morning.
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