GRISWOLDDAD
Parenting, Entertainment, and Travel Tips
Things to Do in Utah
*For a list of the top yearly events in Utah, click here.
Utah is known for is natural wonders, like canyons, amazing rock formations, and of course, a salt lake. The parks, of which there are many, are world famous, such as Monument Valley, Zion National Park, and Bryce Canyon. Since Utah is nicely mountainous, it's also a good place to hit the slopes in the winter, try the Alta ski area, Deer Valley, or one of the other resorts in Park City for some good Utah skiing.
Arches National Park
Four miles north of Moab (see below), you'll find Arches National Park. With over 2000 natural stone arches, plus many other awe inspiring rock pinnacles and formations, "this red rock wonderland will amaze you with its formations, refresh you with its trails, and inspire you with its sunsets." Hiking trails take you to all of the most popular formations, some of the hikes are easy, some strenuous.
The most recognizable arch (hint: it's on the Utah license place) is "Delicate Arch", which is a 3 mile round trip hike, is uphill the whole way. The windows area, though, gives you four arches including "Double Arch" and is just beside the Balanced Rock parking area. Of course, you get to also see a giant rock balanced on a rock column.
Bonneville Salt Flats
This is a very large salt flat in northern Utah. It's the largest salt flat in the US. This is actual salt covering the ground, leftover from a lake that use to be here, similar to the Great Salt Lake. Also, any time you've seen land speed records being set, they've likely been at this place.
Bryce Canyon
Bryce Canyon is a series of giant natural amphitheaters filled with what is called "Hoodoos," which are rock pillars left standing after many years of erosion. Hiking, camping, ranger programs, horseback riding, and stargazing are all fun activities to do while here. There are so many of these pillars, it looks like the canyon is covered in a "forest of rocks." There are small dirt roads and, of course, trails that you can take that'll really get you in the thick of the hoodoos, I'd highly recommend them.
Canyonlands National Park
Canyonlands National Park is another park filled with natural beauty in the form of canyons, buttes, and rivers. The rivers split the park into four districts, the rivers, the Island in the Sky, the Needles, and the Maze. The Island in the Sky is the easiest to reach with pullouts off the road in various locations. The Maze on the other hand is difficult to reach and so takes usually a minimum of three days and requires proper equipment and planning. The Needles area, filled with colorful spires of Cedar Mesa Sandstone, is the in between area. Its trails takes around a full day.
Kanab
Here, we hit the Coral Pink Sand Dunes State Park and did some sledding in the desert. It was a little rough...walking on the sand dunes was hard and tiring, plus sand was blowing. For the small dunes, this was fine, but the boys (and I) wanted to do the biggest dune at least once. So, we trudged up it. Both boys...and my wife...cried at least once.
Once up at the top, I took a sled down with one of my sons. I couldn't steer very well because I was trying to film it...and we crashed. My son jumped up and said, "let's go again!" Sleds move REALLY fast on these dunes!
Once at the bottom, it was my wife's turn with my other son since I wanted them to wait so I could film them separately. Even though she had no reason to not be able to steer with her hands in the sand like I did holding the camera...they crashed about halfway down too. She faceplanted and came up yell-crying. Once my son recovered, he loved the place along with me and his brother. My wife never did.
After sledding we stopped by "Little Hollywood". Kanab itself is also known as Little Hollywood because of the sheer number of old westerns that were filmed here and in the surrounding areas. A Hollywood director in the 20's called it that and the name stuck. "Little Hollywood" is a museum/gift shop devoted to old westerns with a little old west town open air FREE museum that you can walk through made from sets of old movies including "The Outlaw Josey Wales".
Moab
A kooky and fun roadside "Americana" attraction awaited us in Moab called "Hole n the Rock". It's a 5000 square foot home AND old diner carved into the side of a mountain! Albert Christensen lived there after working on it for years with his brother and wife, but technically his father started it as a small shelter for Albert and his brother while he farmed. In the 50's they had a diner where the gift shop currently is. Albert died in 1957, but his wife, Gladys, continued adding to it until she too passed away. She turned it into a gift shop and gave tours of her home (which she was still living in)!
We took the tour and had fun, but they also have a bunch of kitsch stuff around such as a knight standing guard of the grounds, a 2 story outhouse, Mater from Disney's "Cars"… and they have a small zoo! We saw zebras, ostriches, watusis, Vietnamese pot-bellied pigs and camels. We kissed one camel, and the boys got to ride another.
Wilson Arch is a natural sandstone arch just outside of Moab on US Route 191 not quite within Arches National Park.
Monument Valley
Utah and Arizona both claim this magnificent Navajo park as it sits on their border...but you have to enter it in Utah, so I'm giving it to Utah. Monument Valley is filled with magnificent sandstone rock formations and buttes and mesas. This is one of the most photographed areas in the world and has shown up in countless movies, especially westerns. Having been there, for example, I laughed while watching the new Lone Ranger movie because the train kept going by the same rock over and over again. I assume people who have NOT been here would still have noticed that, not sure what they were thinking.
Anyway, back on topic, the park has a great visitor center/gift shop/restaurant, and there area number of companies that offer Navajo led jeep tours deep into Monument Valley. I'd recommend doing one of the jeep tours, since you must be with a Navajo person to go further into the park. Without them, you're not allowed to go much further than the Mitten and Merrick buttes. With a Navajo guide, you can also the Hub, the Sleeping Dragon, the Sun Eye, the Three Sisters, Camel Butte, and others.
Either these formations are named after an explorer in the area that "discovered" them even though the Navajo were already there... or they're named after what the formation sort of looks like in your imagination. For a good list and explanation on many of them, click here. One really nice thing about the guides is that they've done this a lot. They know the best places and angles for pictures possible and are willing to share that knowledge. Our guide also played his flute and sang Navajo music!
The Mittens
The Sun Eye
The Totem Pole
Salt Lake City
Salk Lake City is best known for the lake, of course, but also everything Mormon. This is where Brigham Young called home. The Mormon hot spots are the This is the Place Monument (commemorating Brigham Young's declaration that the Salt Lake Valley is where the Mormon's would call home), Temple Square (the 10 acre behemoth complex owned by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints), the Beehive House and the Lion House (Brigham Young's two residences in the city), and the Salt Lake Tabernacle, where you can hear the world-famous Mormon Tabernacle Choir. The Great Salt Lake has beaches that you can visit while in town, go to Antelope Island for white sandy beaches where you CAN go swimming if you'd like, but it's very salty and people complain of the smell...
Zion National Park
The best description I've heard for Zion National Park is a comparison to the Grand Canyon. With the Grand Canyon, you're on top of a canyon, looking down. With Zion, you're at the bottom, looking up!
Beautiful, majestic scenery abounds. We saw small deer running around during our pass through. Also, you can backpack/hike, bike, camp, climb, horseback ride, and ... canyoneer. As I type this, spell check just underlined that "canyoneer" word, and I believe the park made it up! It's defined as a combination of climbing, rappelling, hiking, and swimming. Prior to reading this, I would've said I did all the above, but it's awfully convenient to narrow that to just the one word. Though I'm assuming even IF you combine all of those activities in a day out, one must be IN a canyon to use the term...so my usage of it will be admittedly limited.
