It’s the last week of September and that means it’s time for Historically Significant Utah Week! Bre and Chris provide a review of Sicilia Mia, and at least according to Chris, it is well deserving of the City Weekly Best Of Awards that it has won. Between the atmosphere and food, it’s really worth the price of admission. Speaking of City Weekly Best Of, don’t forget to vote while you still can for the 2021 awards.
With Hawaii around the corner, its a relatively short show. Jeremy does let us know about Operation Here Kitty Kitty, and it sounds like it is a success thus far. Only time will tell if he can permanently scare off the rats, by feeding the neighborhood strays. Don’t worry, we make sure he plans to keep feeding them through winter.
But the main thing we talk about is the Bonneville Salt Flats. Formed out of the remnants of Lake Bonneville, a lake pretty young in terms of the Earth, the salt flats, and the shoreline in general offer a wealth of history and scientific testing abundance. The lake was at it’s peak maybe some 25,000 years ago is all, and really formed most of what we now think of as the Salt Lake Valley. Reaching as far north as Idaho, and south as Sevier county, it was a massive lake. The Great Salt Lake, Utah Lake and Sevier Lake are what are left of the old lake.
It left us with a pretty massive gem of a landscape though. Due to the way the ancient lake receded, mostly by evaporation, we have been left in some areas with massive beds of really flat salt. These are known as the salt flats, for obvious reason. Here we have a crust from inches to many many feet deep of just plain old salt. It’s crystalized and hard, and the winter snow keeps it smooth.
Many folks explored the area, and the poor Donor party fell victim to the hospitability of the flats, eventually arriving so late to the Sierra Nevada range, that they ate each other. It didn’t take long though for people to figure out, that the flatness and length of these areas, lent their hand to going really fast. So in 1914 the first land speed record was broken roughly where the Bonneville Speedway now resides. A quick look around online and you can see just how many records were broken at the salt flats.
Of course there is more. Many films have been shot at the Bonneville Salt Flats. Independence Day, Con Air, and the Amazing Race are all things that have scenes from the flats. Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End and Star Wars VIII: The Last Jedi are two of the most famous. Whether your in Davey Jones locker or on a foreign planet trying to stop the First Order from killing the rebels, the salt flats are amazing.
You can visit them any time. Our recommendation is to drive to the rest stop on I80, just east of Wendover. You can walk out on the salt, and the rest stop even has a place to wash your shoes off after. Please don’t drive on them, they are very fragile in most places, and your vehicle will do long term permanent damage to them. They are managed by the Bureau of Land Management, and you can find lots of information on them here.
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