Antelope Meadows Yurt

June 8-9th Gene, myself, and my boys all backpacked into Antelope Meadows yurt, owned by Blue Sky Adventure, to get the deets for an update on the YurtsOfUtah.com website and a KALL radio report.

One might think that a 2.5 mile backpack should be no big deal, but as this is Blue Sky Adventures first year with the yurt they had not yet marked the trails. Feeling that pointing out the yurt on the next mountain should be enough to help us get there, we followed the verbal directions as best we could, and finally after 3 miles looked down upon a yurt. "Interesting" I thought. "This yurt has a house next door. That's not usual." So we made our way down the mountain, happy to be at the end of our pack, only to find it was a saloon-style restaurant owned by another company completely, and closed down. Luckily, a phone call informed us we only had to follow the reservoir and head south to find our yurt.

The adventure had just begun. I'll sing the praises of solar lighting, a big fire pit, laminate wood floors and the clean that comes with new. No question this is the nicest yurt in the Utah yurt system. The location is a lot of fun also because Blue Sky has kayaks they keep on the reservoir, so my boys and I played Lewis and Clark as we paddled around the water looking for frogs and exploring the water world.

This yurt gets an A+ for convenience. If you don't want to hike in, you can drive to the yurt. Road comes right up, and it's a good thing, because just as the boys fell asleep we started hearing something below the yurt clawing and chewing. Loud and persistent, 2 hours later we were getting no sleep and were slightly freaked out as to what was trying to eat out the bottom of the yurt. Not one, not two, but I could hear 3 different eating patterns. I called the owner at 12:30 a.m. to let him know some nocturnal animals were having their way with the yurt and he may want to come do something about it if he wished his yurt to be around very long.

The ranch manager and his assistant used that road, drove to the yurt at 1 a.m. and shot 2 large porcupines that were hurriedly eating away at the yurt and seemed immune to our attempts to throw rocks at them, dump water on them through the deck, or scare them off with the piercing light of headlamp. The things you learn...who knew that trex deck was a porcupines favorite food? Turns out that the salt found in adhesive used in laminate is a primary fetish of porcupines.

We tried to BBQ steaks on the charcoal grill, but I don't think the grill got hot enough. Ended up throwing most of the steak in the fire pit. Slept on air mattresses, which are indeed comfy alternatives to the floor. Luckily mine had an automatic inflator attached as it had to be filled regularly.

This yurt is set up for groups, couples, families, retreats. Blue Sky is an adventure company that will send out fly-fishing guides, kayak instructors, and even a rock climbing instructor if you want. They are on the verge of a much larger development - the yurt is just the first step. For info. on the yurt go to www.yurtsofutah.com.

This was Ethan's first official backpack trip! He did great! Molly dog went along too. Gene's first packpack with the broken hip. A fine adventure. Except we got lost on the way back too.