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Sunset Beach is a lovely beach in The Great Salt Lake State Park. It features lovely views of the lake and islands. It also provides access to Black Rock which is a large feature to the west of the park. We have done it before, but it has been a minute.
After stopping to see the mirabilite mounds we decided to add on this beach today.
Quick Details:
Length: Approximately 3 miles out and back from the Visitor Center, depending on how much exploring you do.
Trail Type: Out and back, Loop option, meander.
Difficulty: It’s flat, but soft beach sand. DR3.
Elevation Gain: About 75 feet.
Restroom: Yes, both at the marina, and in the Visitor Center (when it is open).
Dogs? Yes, leashed. Please clean up after your furry friends.
Other Info: Fee area $10.00 per car. However if you just want to see Black Rock you can avoid that by taking the road further west. Boots highly recommended as the beach is mucky.
To Get Here:
Take i80 to exit 104 (west of Salt Lake City). Head north, then turn left at Saltair. Follow the frontage road for about 1.8 miles and you will reach the fee station.
The trail is on the west side of the park, around the marina.
The Trail:
The Kennecott smelter stack from The Visitor Center.
You can shave a little bit of mileage off by parking closer to the marina.
Flagpole in the style of a boat mast next to the marina. That's cute.
The state park sign. I don’t think we have ever stopped at it before now.
Continuing around the marina. I am pretty sure this is the closest you can park. It will only shave off about 3/10ths of a mile out and back.
The south end of the marina.
The docks start emptying out the further west we go. I am going to guess the water is more shallow that way,
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Panoramic.
Paramotorer.
The smoke stack again.
At the west end of the marina you find a sign pointing you to the north.
Quick walk along this dike on the west end of the marina.
The marina from the west.
At the northwest corner you will reach the beach access. This is just about a half mile from the Visitor Center.
Warning about avian influenza.
Where the marina enters the lake. You can get a better view of it from the other side on the Taz Point trail.
Hitting the beach.
Black Rock is about a mile from here.
Little closer zoom.
The marina entrance again.
The smelter stack again.
Compare that to our tallest building in Salt Lake, The Astra Tower which is 449 feet tall.
Little stream.
Heading out to the lake.
Black Rock again.
More streams to cross.
This one is full of algae.
Some parts of the beach are a little… gross.
Lots of streams. We moved up to a sandbar at this point to get out of the muck.
More streams and lots of seagulls.
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Panoramic showing Stansbury Island and Antelope Island. Promontory Point in between.
Another stream cutting across the sandbar.
Coming from a swampy area above.
Texture. This beach is great for interesting texture and color combinations.
More streams and Stansbury Island.
Another stream crossing.
Closer.
The beach and Black Rock.
The patches of snow have some neat patterns. I want to say hoarfrost, but it seems a little warm for that, but then again, if it is in the shade…
Algae and pebbles.
Black Rock. It looks like we are getting close! Cough… not so much.
Antelope Island.
Stansbury Island.
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Another panoramic.
Pebbles.
Another stream.
The smelter stack again.
Seagulls.
Continuing out to Black Rock.
Odd, almost perfectly round discolorations. I suspect something growing in the odd depressions I find around here that I call potholes.
Random tire and pole.
It looks like we are almost there! (Spoiler, we are not).
Another tire and pole. Odd.
Another stream.
Seagulls.
This guy was quite big. I thought he might have been something else. But, no, just a big seagull.
Continuing along.
Another stream.
More seagulls.
One of the, what I call, potholes. I still have not found what causes them, and if there is an official name but I seem them all over the place here. I suspect they are caused by rocks sitting in place while water runs around them removing the dirt from under it? But, that’s just my best guess.
Continuing along.
Texture shot. Some of these almost look like aerial shots of the the landscape.
I forgot about this peninsula or maybe a jetty. Black Rock looked like it was on this, but is not. We still have a little bit to go. I wanna say this is about 2/3rds of the way.
Lots of phragmites. Just need to figure out the best way through.
Looking back towards the marina.
Antelope Island.
Random posts. Which adds to the confusion of whether this is a manmade jetty or natural peninsula.
Black Rock.
Overpass to the south. That is the alternate, shorter and easier route to Black Rock that you can do without entering the State Park. But of course, then you miss the fun beach. We did that last year. It is about 6/10ths of a mile out and back, and mostly old pavement.
Looking north across the peninsula/jetty.
More wood debris.
Random pile of boulders.
Phragmites.
Closer.
Dead bird. Nothing to be concerned about, thousands of birds visit the Great Salt Lake. Some die. The salt water tends to… mummify them a bit so the bodies stick around a little longer. But, as the sign we saw earlier stated, bird flu has been detected here so you know, best to not touch it.
Black Rock.
More "potholes".
Stansbury Island.
Antelope Island.
The rock formations on the peninsula.
Panoramic.
Texture.
Bird tracks.
More phragmites to try to get through.
Another dead bird.
A sand bar.
Black Rock and a large puddle we need to find a way around.
The large puddle again.
The smelter stack.
More “potholes”.
Black Rock.
Another little stream.
Black Rock again.
With it blocking the sun, so we can see it better.
Closer.
Up on the peninsula. This is about 1.43 miles from the Visitor Center.
So, now we are going to explore Black Rock a bit.
Looking back towards the marina.
The smelter stack.
Black Rock.
As we learned last time: Tens of thousand of years ago a piece of the Oquirrh Mountains rolled off into Lake Bonneville. After the lake drained Black Rock became a a landmark for humans for the next 13,000 years. Early Indian tribes used it and it became a resort between the 1860’s and the 1960’s. Which made it one of the longest run resorts on the Great Salt Lake. Neat!
The south end.
North end.
Random hand prints.
It looks like there was a monument marker here at some point. It’s a shame it is gone.
However, there is now a monument marker dedicated to the site south of here, near Saltair (photo from my 2021 trip out here).
“From 1881 to 1893 Garfield Beach was the most famous and finest recreation resort on the shores of Great Salt Lake, with its railroad station, lunch stand, restaurant, bath houses and pier leading to the dance pavilion, and with the pioneer steamboat "City of Corinne" exhibited at anchor. Lake Point was located 1½ miles west. A three story hotel erected there by Dr. Jeter Clinton became a stopping place for Overland stages. The boulders used for this shaft was taken from "Old Buffalo Ranch" one half mile west.”
And:
“On July 27, 1847, an exploring party of pioneers bathed near historic Black Rock. In 1851, the first recorded Fourth of July celebration was held here; 150 vehicles and 60 horsemen arrived from Salt Lake City. A huge, homemade flag was unfurled. About 1860, a rock home was erected where guests were entertained. In 1880, Alonzo Hyde and David J. Taylor erected 100 bathhouses, a bowery, boardwalk and other amenities. Steamboats sailing the lake were an attraction.”
California Trail Historic Route.
We decided to keep going around clockwise.
The south end.
Continuing around.
The west side.
The view west.
Back to Black Rock.
Little window.
The rock again.
Random brick. As I mentioned, there used to be a resort here.
The window again.
It kind of looks like an elephant from this angle.
More signs of the old resort.
I wonder what these dark spots on the light stone are.
The north end.
More signs of the old resort.
This is weird though. I wonder what it was.
View to the north. I can just make out Promontory Point through the haze.
Stansbury Island.
Antelope Island.
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Panoramic.
Phragmites.
Black Rock.
The window again.
More weird black spots.
Closer.
I oddly decided to scramble up a bit here.
Little crevice.
Closer.
Another little alcove.
More black spots.
Crack.
The lake and Antelope Island.
Back to the rock, with some fun layers.
Itty bitty window.
Back down to the bottom. Uh, does anybody else see the monkey face? Or how about the eagle?
Another alcove.
Back to the east side.
Alright, back down to Sunset Beach. We wandered around for about .22 miles.
Accumulated hail.
Little frozen pond. I didn’t think it had been cold enough for that, but I guess I was wrong.
Footprints exposing some clay beneath the surface.
Wetlands.
More bird prints.
The smelter stack again.
The peninsula again. I decided we should go around it this time, and maybe walk along the shore of the lake. I am glad I did, because it seemed to be easier, and less gross. For the most part haha.
Antelope Island.
Stansbury Island.
Random mason jar. No telling how old it is, and I wasn’t gonna mess around with broken glass to try and find out… not like I have any expertise in doing so anyway haha. But, it is possibly a remnant of the resort, or it could be something someone dropped last year. Who knows?
Antelope Island again.
Our shadows, and the peninsula.
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Another panoramic of the lake.
The smelter stack again.
The peninsula again.
“Pothole” as I call em.
More of them.
The peninsula.
The smelter stack and overpass.
Radio tower of some sort on that peak up there.
View east.
These structures lead me to think there might have been a pier here at some time.
The other way towards the peninsula.
Fun texture.
Antelope Island.
Stansbury Island.
Sandbar. We eventually found a way out to it.
The Great Salt Lake. Wow. It is super pretty today.
Waves crashing on the shore. It’s almost like the ocean, but not quite.
Stansbury Island.
Antelope Island.
The little sandbar we are now walking along.
The smelter stack again.
The sandbar again.
The lake is such a beautiful shade of blue today.
Promontory Point.
The smelter stack again.
Mountains.
Bird and dog tracks.
The lake again.
Break in the sandbar. We were able to hop across this one.
More sandbar.
Lots of bird tracks.
The lake again. I just can’t get over how pretty it is right now.
Another break in the sandbar. This one was a little too far to hop, and the water was a little too deep to wade across. Luckily, just a short ways back there appeared to be a good shallow spot to wade back to the main beach.
The sandbar continues for some ways though.
Safely across and back to the main beach. As you can see by the break in the sandbar ahead, we didn't have to backtrack too far.
The break in the sandbar we couldn’t cross.
Stansbury Island.
Antelope Island.
Continuing along.
Another dead bird.
Fun texture.
Another panoramic of the lake.
The beach.
Some old rusted and crusted object.
Approaching the marina.
The smelter stack again.
Seagull.
Antelope Island.
Stansbury Island.
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Another panoramic.
More “potholes”.
Seagulls.
Fun colorful puddle.
The marina entrance.
Antelope Island.
Stansbury Island.
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Another panoramic.
The sandbar and seagulls.
Another “pothole”. This one is almost a perfect circle. Neat!
Seagulls.
"Potholes".
More beach.
At this point we started to scan the marina wall to try to figure out where we needed to get back up onto it.
More “potholes”.
Wide fanned out stream to cross. But it is super shallow here.
Discolored spots.
More “potholes”.
Aha! We spotted the trail back up to the marina. Now we just need to make our way over to it.
The marina entrance.
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Panoramic of the marina.
Almost there.
Antelope Island.
The smelter stack.
Skeletal bird. That's actually pretty cool.
Looking back towards Black Rock as the sun gets ready to set. I think this might be the shot of the day! It kind of perfectly captures the beaches namesake.
The trail back up to the top of the marina wall.
Now that we have done both options, high beach vs lake side, I definitely prefer lake side, and would recommend doing that route both ways. But it was fun exploring both.
Up on the marina wall.
The marina.
The south end.
The marina.
The State Ranger boat at the bend.
Back west as the sun sets.
Back to the restrooms, and what I just learned is the boat tours building.
Great Salt Lake Boat Tours.
Bonneville Rowing stone.
Some of the signs.
The north part of the marina.
Campgrounds.
Back to the Visitor Center, which is closed for the evening.
Heading back out of the park (Passenger Seat Photography (PSP)).
Saltair III (PSP).
I wish we had dinked around a little bit longer, because tonight was supposed to be a good night for seeing the Northern Lights possibly this far south again and this is a good spot for that. But, we were both hungry and there isn’t food out here. There are a few fast food options about 5 or 6 miles to the west at Lake Point, but.. meh. Sometimes needs overrule wants. And sometimes vice versa haha.
Heading back into town on i80 (PSP).
Downtown Salt Lake City (PSP).
After this we attempted to go to Burgertory again, but they closed for the holiday (as they should so no hard feelings) but we had set our minds on burgers! So we wandered around for a bit until we found an open joint that had better than fast food burgers.
Anyway, that was fun! It has been a little while since we have done that beach. We saw 1 person at Black Rock, but otherwise had the entire beach to ourselves today which was nice. The beach is pretty, and has a lot of fun texture to enjoy. Black Rock is always super neat as well. Plus, the lake was absolutely stunning today! 9 out of 10 squirrels.
As for difficulty, it is pretty flat, with a small hill. But is is soft beach sand which is a little more tough. But still, easy going. DR3.
Dogs are allowed, leashed.
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