Lakes in Utah

The Great Salt Lake is the largest saltwater lake in the Western Hemisphere and the eighth-largest terminal lake in the world. A remnant of prehistoric Lake Bonneville, which covered much of western Utah tens of thousands of years ago, the lake has no outlet. Because water escapes only through evaporation, salts and dissolved minerals concentrate, creating salinity levels far exceeding typical seawater.

Lake Powell is an immense man-made reservoir on the Colorado River in Utah and northern Arizona, created by the flooding of Glen Canyon behind Glen Canyon Dam. With nearly 2,000 miles of winding canyon shoreline, it is celebrated for towering red Navajo sandstone cliffs, side slot canyons, houseboating, and natural arches including Rainbow Bridge National Monument.

Bear Lake is an ancient freshwater lake straddling the border between northern Utah and southeastern Idaho. Often called the "Caribbean of the Rockies" for its astonishing intense turquoise-blue color (caused by microscopic suspended calcium carbonate crystals), Bear Lake is over 250,000 years old and is home to four endemic fish species found nowhere else on planet Earth.