The town and the line
One town, two states.
Wendover is a small city on the far western edge of Tooele County, right where Interstate 80 meets the Nevada line. The 2020 census counted 1,115 people on the Utah side. Its twin, West Wendover, is a separate city in Nevada, and the state line runs straight down the middle of the built-up strip, which is why a single place seems to have two personalities.
The Nevada half is the neon one. The casino resorts, and the 63 foot neon cowboy known as Wendover Will who has stood since 1952, are all across the line in West Wendover. That is the one line this guide gives them, because the Utah side is the reason to slow down: an atomic-era airfield, two archaeological caves, a warm desert lake, a backcountry loop, and the white plain of the salt flats just to the east.
For most travelers Wendover is a refuel and a night's sleep on the way to or from Reno, and that is the honest frame. But the Utah side rewards a stop of its own, and everything below is on that side of the line.
The airfield that trained the crews who ended the war
Just south of town World War II history Its own page
During World War II the airfield just south of town was a huge, deliberately remote bomber-training base, and the 509th Composite Group, the unit that flew the 1945 atomic missions, trained here before it deployed. Today the Historic Wendover Airfield preserves original flight line buildings, and volunteers have restored many of them, including the B-29 hangar.
That story is large enough to have its own guide. The full history of the base, the museum, and the aircraft lives on our Historic Wendover Airfield page.
Danger Cave and Juke Box Cave
Just outside Wendover Guided tour to go inside Warmer months
Danger Cave is one of the most important archaeological sites in the Great Basin, with a record of human use reaching back some 12,000 years. In 2019 it became Danger Cave State Monument, Utah's first state monument, and it is also a National Historic Landmark on the National Register of Historic Places. The honest thing to know before you drive out is how you actually see it: the cave is fenced and gated, so you can walk up and look in through the gate at any time, but the inside is reached only on a scheduled guided tour.
Those tours are led by an archaeologist through Metcalf Archaeological Consultants, and they usually pair Danger Cave with the nearby Juke Box Cave over about four hours. The tours run on set dates in the warmer months rather than daily, so the move is to book ahead through the operator rather than showing up cold. If the schedule does not line up, the gate view is still worth the short trip.
Juke Box Cave, about half a mile away, is the human-scale companion: it holds prehistoric rock art and a concrete dance floor that Army Air Corps servicemen poured during the war, running a jukebox and dancing out in the desert, which is how it earned its name.
The details
Before you go
- Book the guided tour ahead through Metcalf Archaeological Consultants; dates and fees change, so confirm the current schedule with the operator.
- There are no restrooms at the caves; the nearest facilities are back at the truck stops in Wendover.
- The walk to Juke Box Cave is short but steep; wear real shoes and bring water.
- Look but do not touch. These are protected sites, and the rock art and deposits are exactly what makes them a monument.
Blue Lake, the warm spring in the desert
About 20 miles south Free Open year round
Twenty miles south of Wendover, out where you would least expect it, sits a warm, spring-fed lake about 10 acres across. Blue Lake is geothermal: the water rises from the ground near 85 degrees, which keeps the lake open for diving all year, even when the desert around it is frozen. It runs about 60 feet deep, holds underwater training platforms, and is one of the very few Utah waters usable for scuba year round, which is why programs including the University of Utah bring divers out to it.
The lake and the marsh around it are public and managed by the Bureau of Land Management, but the surrounding country is the Utah Test and Training Range, an active military range. That is the reason to stay at the lake and its immediate shore and to watch for signs. It is a long, remote drive on unpaved road, so treat it the way you would any desert outing: full tank, water, and a map you do not need signal to read.
The details
The Silver Island Mountains byway
I-80 Exit 4 54 mile gravel loop High clearance
For a real backcountry drive with almost nobody else on it, the Silver Island Mountains Backcountry Byway loops 54 miles of gravel and dirt around the Silver Island Mountains through the Great Basin. It leaves I-80 at Exit 4 just east of Wendover, onto Leppy Pass Road, and Tooele County grades it only as needed, so conditions vary. Most of it goes in a high-clearance vehicle in dry weather, and there is a good chance you will have the whole loop to yourself.
The north side of the loop crosses the Hastings Cutoff, the 1846 wagon route the Donner-Reed party followed across this desert, marked here and there along the way. An optional 14 mile spur loops around Floating Island. There are no services anywhere on it and no reliable signal, so this is a plan-ahead drive, not a spur-of-the-moment one.
The details
Staging for the salt flats
Just east of town Free Its own page
The Bonneville Salt Flats begin about 10 miles east of Wendover, and Wendover is the town you use to visit them: the last fuel, the last food, and the last bed before that white plain. Whether you can drive out onto the salt depends entirely on the season, and getting that wrong is how cars end up stuck in wet salt.
Because the timing and the access are their own subject, the salt flats have their own guide. See the Bonneville Salt Flats for the dry-versus-wet driving rules, the speedway access road, Speed Week, and the Tree of Utah.
Out here, Wendover is the last services for a long way.
Blue Lake, the Silver Island loop, and the salt flats all sit beyond the last gas station, on unpaved or unserviced roads with no cell signal and, in places, an active military range next door. Fill the tank in town, carry water and a downloaded map, drive the back roads only in dry weather, and turn around if the surface turns soft. Do not drive onto the salt when it is wet.
