Antelope Island

This first lesson block is very field-trip heavy.  After all, how can you learn about your state geography if you don't get out and see it?  Saturday we took a trip to Antelope Island in the Great Salt Lake.

 Three of the 500+ bison roaming around the island.

Our first stop was the Fielding Garr Ranch.  We had been to Antelope Island once before but didn't get to visit the ranch, so it was a top priority this time around.  This ranch was settled in 1848, only a year after the Mormon pioneers entered the Salt Lake Valley, at a natural spring.  This opens up a perfect discussion for Dallin and I since a huge focus on our block is on the relationship between humans and the land.  Talking about why settlers would need to locate themselves near fresh water is a natural part of those kinds of discussions.  The ranch house is the oldest structure in the state built by white people that still stands on its original foundation.  The cattle and sheep on this island were part of the LDS church's tithing herd (the early Mormons "tithed" on their livestock, grain, and produce, since most had little if any cash).  The funds from the sale of these herds went toward the Perpetual Emigration Fund of the Church, which was money used to transport settlers across the plains and to provide wagons and handcarts for them.  Brigham Young also kept his own personal herds at Antelope Island.  Fascinating stuff!

The kids got to rope "cattle" in the yard... but it's not as easy as it looks.

Getting water the old-fashioned way.  See the lake in the background?

Sariah enjoying herself in the 1840's style living room of the ranch house.

Coming out of the spring house.  In the door and down those steps is water!

The spring itself: undernearth all those green plants and moss is water.

We decided it would have been great fun to be a kid and live on this ranch.  So many things to explore!  Yeah, you wouldn't have any neighbor kids to play with... but there would be so many things to do, as long as you had a few brothers and sisters around, it'd be heaven.

One person is relaxing on the porch, the other person...  not so much.

Here is where all the marsh grass starts between the ranch and the lake, near the spring.  This was a little tunnel through the grass.  A great place for hide and seek, as long as you actually get found.

Preston was determined to have a stick too.

After we left the ranch, we stopped for some rock-climbing adventures:

Then we drove to the other side of the island and took a little hike up a big hill for more rock-climbing adventures. 

The view was incredible!  Antelope Island really is an awesome place, and is now a favorite with my kids.  It's too bad it took me 24 years of living here to discover it.