It can be easy to plan a full vacation without really leaving Salt Lake City, with it being so rich in arts, culture, history, entertainment and outdoor recreation. That said, this spectacularly situated metro area—tucked against the great wall of the Wasatch Range near the ethereal vastness of the Great Salt Lake—is also quite the launchpad for amazing day-tripping, here where the Rocky Mountains meet the Great Basin.
Below, learn more about the top eight day trips from Salt Lake City, to help fill out your Utah trip with memorable and unique destinations.
1. Park City
- Address/Location: Park City, UT
- Distance From Salt Lake City: 33 miles
Park City got its start as a silver-mining boomtown back in the late 1800s but had quite the major 20th-century makeover to become one of North America’s premier snowsport hotspots and alpine getaways. Situated about 7,000 feet up in the Wasatch Range, the town offers front-row seats to the “Greatest Snow on Earth,” celebrated in the biggest ski-resort complex in the U.S. and taking center stage during the 2002 Winter Olympics. When you’re taking in the snow activities, you can stroll amid the hustle-and-bustle of Historic Main Street and partake of a top-class dining scene.
2. Timpanogos Cave National Monument
- Address/Location: 2038 E. Alpine Lp Rd, American Fork, UT
- Distance From Salt Lake City: 40 miles
At 11,752 feet, Mount Timpanogos—the second-tallest peak in the Wasatch Range—looms majestically and unmistakably over Utah Valley and the southern Wasatch Front metro area. Eye-catching as its soaring summit is, this mighty mountain also holds the fabulous limestone cave system protected in Timpanogos Cave National Monument. Open seasonally for ranger-guided tours, the three viewable caves contain a wealth of spectacular speleothems (cave formations. The somewhat strenuous 1.5-mile paved path leading to the cave entrance is its own attraction, delivering sweeping views over the American Fork Canyon. If you have extra time, enhance one of the top day trips from Salt Lake City by reaching the national monument via the beautiful Alpine Scenic Loop.
3. Antelope Island State Park
- Address/Location: 4528 W. 1700 S., Syracuse, UT
- Distance From Salt Lake City: 41 miles
The biggest island in the Great Salt Lake (and turning into a peninsula when water levels are low), Antelope Island ranks high, if not at the very top, of Salt Lake City day trips. Covering some 28,022 acres and rising to a mountainous divide in its interior, the island offers a wealth of recreational attractions—beaches, a marina, a campground, picnic areas, hiking and mountain biking—but is likely best-known for its wildlife-viewing. A herd of American bison, currently managed at between 500 and 600 head, has roamed the island since 1893; the annual fall buffalo round-up, done on horseback, is a top-draw spectacle. Other wildlife sightings can include pronghorn—the “antelope” for which the island is named—as well as mule deer, bighorn sheep and a variety of smaller mammals.
4. Bridal Veil Falls
- Address/Location: Provo Canyon, off U.S. 189
- Distance From Salt Lake City: 45 miles
Among the natural centerpieces of glorious Provo Canyon, a Wasatch Range defile between Mount Timpanogos and Mount Cascade, is the roughly 600-foot two-tiered drop of Bridal Veil Falls. Although a 1996 avalanche took out the popular tram that once ran to the brink of the waterfall, hiking here still introduces you firsthand to its splendor. For a good picnic spot nearby, steer your way to Bridal Veil Falls Park.
5. Golden Spike National Historical Park
- Address/Location: 6200 N. 22300 W., Corinne, UT
- Distance From Salt Lake City: 87 miles
History buffs will love a visit to Promontory Summit, some 30 miles west of Brigham City, Utah. Golden Spike National Historical Park here commemorates where, on May 10, 1869, the Transcontinental Railroad was finally completed. At this National Park Service-managed site, you can tour the Visitor Center, admire replicas of the two steam locomotives (Jupiter and No. 119) that met during the Last Spike Ceremony that day, sightsee along a pair of designated auto tours and savor scenery and historical traces on a 1.5-mile walking trail.
6. Spiral Jetty
- Address/Location: Rozel Point, Great Salt Lake (Corinne, UT)
- Distance From Salt Lake City: 100 miles
It’s a bit of a drive to reach the most famous “land-art” installation of sculptor Robert Smithson, set on the beautifully bleak northeastern shores of the Great Salt Lake, but well worth it. Smithson created Spiral Jetty in 1970 from some 6,000 tons of native basalt boulders and soil, shaping a 1,500-foot-long coil out into the nearshore waters. (Smithson died in a plane crash near Amarillo, Texas only three years later, age 35, while inspecting the site of another of his planned earthworks from the air.)
Sometimes submerged, often exposed or even left high-and-dry at lower lake levels, Spiral Jetty is a striking landmark that, since 1999, has been owned and managed by the Dia Art Foundation. Reached from the Golden Spike National Historical Park about 30 to 45 minutes away via dirt roads (get detailed driving directions here), the site is undeveloped and primitive; practice Leave No Trace ethics when visiting.
7. Bonneville Salt Flats
- Address/Location: Leppy Pass Road (40°45'45.3"N, 113°53'46.3"W)
- Distance From Salt Lake City: 110 miles
Among the most iconic landscapes in the American West, the roughly 30,000-acre Bonneville Salt Flats encompass an otherworldly expanse of halite- and gypsum-dominated deposits left behind when Ancient Lake Bonneville (of which the Great Salt Lake is a remnant) receded.
Set in the Great Salt Lake Desert about an hour-and-a-half from Salt Lake City, the Flats are managed as a Special Recreation Management Area by the Bureau of Land Management and are a famed destination not only for sightseeing but also speed-racing. Several auto-racing events are held here each year, including Speed Week in August. But the Bonneville Salt Flats are also worth experiencing for their inherent geologic, ecologic and scenic value—so long as you come prepared for a remote setting with patchy cell coverage, adhere to current driving regulations and restrictions and do everything you can to minimize your impact on this highly unique environment.
8. Bear Lake State Park
- Address/Location: 940 N. Bear Lake Blvd (US Hwy 89), Garden City, UT
- Distance From Salt Lake City: 120 miles
Occupying a faulted basin on the Utah-Idaho border, 112-square-mile Bear Lake has been nicknamed the “Caribbean of the Rockies” on account of its piercing blue hue, the product of suspended carbonate derived from limestone of the nearby Bear River Range. Bear Lake State Park offers beachgoing, swimming, watersports, angling (including ice-fishing for the freshwater whitefish called cisco) and more—some of the best things to do near Salt Lake City when it comes to waterfront recreation and R&R. Rendezvous Beach in the park gets its name from great summer gatherings of American Indians and mountain men (including Jedediah Smith) held on this lakeshore in 1827 and 1828.
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