Buffalo Ranches Trail in West Farmington

Tonight I decided to do a little exploring and go walking/running on a trail that I was unfamiliar with. I drove to the west side of Farmington to a place called Buffalo Ranches where there is a parking area next to a trailhead. I have never been on this trail before, nor have I seen it on a map, but it looked like a good paved trail and so I decided to give it a try.

I headed north on the trail, past the Buffalo Ranches, then turned west. The trail began to loop to the south and go around the ranches and I thought it would then continue to loop and head back to my car, but instead it kept going south, past the ranches and into the wetland area. (The picture above is a picture of Buffalo Ranches.) This wetland area, I later learned, isthe old shoreline of the Great Salt Lake and the trail along this area is 2 miles in length.

In the wetland area there were lots of birds and for some reason one bird seemed to beco me quite angry with me. It kept flying above me, squawking a couple of times and then diving down towards my head. It did this about 10 times, each time getting closer to my head. I kept waving my arms and yelling at the bird and finally he decided to leave me alone. By this time the sun was beginning to set and I was getting a little nervous that I would be out in the middle of nowhere, with a crazy bird attacking me, in the dark.

The trail seemed to head south for a ways and then to my delight it eventually did begin to turn back to the east. By this time, however, I was way past the area where I parked my car and the sun had already gone down. The mosquitos were fierce and I was getting eaten alive. I was just hoping that if I stayed on the trail it would eventually lead me back to my car.

After a ways, the trail turned again and headed back to the north in the direction of my car and I was glad to finally be going in the right direction. However, when the trail turned off to the east again, in a direction that seemed to lead away from my car, I gave up on the trail and instead followed a road that headed in the direction I wanted to go. After a little bit, I did eventually get back to my car, but it was almost completely dark by this time.

Lessons learned from this experience:

1. take some time to be familiar with a trail beforehand


2. if walking/hiking in wetland areas, take bug spray


3. don't go walking in unfamiliar areas as the sun is beginning to go down


4. let someone know where you're going, just in case

Luckily I did have my cell phone with me and also some water or this would also have been on the list of lessons learned.