Utah Ranch

We’ve been on the road almost 10 weeks and it was time for a break. We’ve now driven over 9000 miles and visited 17 states. We decided to stay on the Larson Ranch for a week to relax and enjoy the beautiful surroundings.

The Ranch has been in the family since 1853 when Great Great Grampa arrived with Brigham Young and the other Mormon pioneers. Our host John is a cattle rancher while his brother runs sheep on their shared, several thousand acres of farmland. They both own thousands of head. We are staying in the original remodeled homestead, John and his brother live elsewhere (?). Our house is surrounded by hundreds of corralled and pastured livestock, the constant mooing and bleating of young and old animals fills the air. The new born lambs often sound like distressed children ! There is constant farming activity from dawn to dusk. Like everything the Mormons do, the Ranch is neat and orderly.

This 50 mile long valley, surrounded by the snow capped Wasatch Mountains, is the least developed, best preserved, most productive ranch land we’ve seen in the West. A majority of it remains much as it was a hundred years ago, with all the original parcels and even fencing intact. Every evening before dinner we take a drive through a new section we haven’t seen, it’s like stepping back in time, viewing a rapidly vanishing way of life. It only survives due to its isolation. Somehow this valley should be preserved. a