47 Utah Things That Actually Deserve a Road Trip

1. Sun Tunnels, Great Basin Desert Four massive concrete tubes arranged in an X pattern in the middle of nowhere near Wendover. Artist Nancy Holt drilled holes in each one to mimic star constellations, and on the solstices, the sun rises and sets perfectly framed through the tunnels.

2. Spiral Jetty, Great Salt Lake A 1,500-foot coil of black basalt rock jutting into the rust-colored water near Rozel Bay. Robert Smithson built it in 1970, and depending on the lake's water levels, it disappears and reappears — right now it's very much visible.

3. The Tree of Utah, I-80 An 87-foot concrete sculpture covered in colorful spheres sitting alone on the Bonneville Salt Flats. Artist Karl Momen built it in the 1980s and you'll drive past it between Salt Lake City and Wendover wondering what you just saw.

4. Fantasy Canyon, Vernal A 10-acre pocket of wildly eroded clay formations about 27 miles south of Vernal. The shapes look like something between melted candles and alien architecture — zero foot traffic, totally free.

5. Devil's Garden, Escalante A short, easy walk through hoodoos and arches off Hole-in-the-Rock Road near Escalante. Most people blow past it to get to Coyote Gulch, which means you'll often have it to yourself.

6. Bonneville Salt Flats The dried remnant of a prehistoric lake that once covered most of Utah. Walk out onto the flats and the horizon disappears — it's one of the flattest, whitest places on earth, and it's free to access off I-80 near Wendover.

7. Stansbury Island, Great Salt Lake A quiet island in the southern arm of the lake with pink-tinted water from salt-loving bacteria and algae. Most people have no idea it exists, and you can drive right out to it.

8. Coral Pink Sand Dunes, Kanab Deep pink and red sand dunes created by eroded Navajo sandstone southwest of Kanab. You can hike them, OHV them, or just stand there and wonder how Utah hides stuff this good.

9. Devil's Slide, Morgan Two parallel limestone fins jutting out of a hillside along I-84 near Croydon that look exactly like a giant playground slide. Pull over, take the photo, move on — it takes five minutes and it's worth it.

10. Newspaper Rock, Canyonlands A single sandstone panel covered in over 650 petroglyphs left by at least 10 different cultures over 2,000 years. It's right off Highway 211 between Moab and the Needles District — no hiking required.

11. Nine Mile Canyon, Price A 40-mile canyon drive through what some call the world's longest art gallery, with thousands of petroglyphs and pictographs on the canyon walls. Bring gas and a paper map — cell service is nonexistent.

12. Mystic Hot Springs, Monroe Natural hot springs in central Utah where you soak in vintage claw-foot bathtubs perched on terraced rock formations. It's strange, it works, and Monroe is one of those small Utah towns that most people have never stopped in.

13. Delicate Arch, Moab (at night) You've seen the postcard photo. What you haven't done is hike up there under a full moon with no crowds and no noise. The 3-mile round trip is completely different after dark.

14. Goosenecks State Park, Mexican Hat The San Juan River makes five tight loops cutting 1,000 feet into the canyon floor below a paved overlook. It took the river 6 million years to carve those curves and it costs $5 to see them.

15. Paria Rimrocks and Toadstool Hoodoos, Kanab A 1.5-mile hike to hoodoos that look like giant mushrooms in red and white rock. It's easy, it's photogenic, and it's about 45 minutes from Kanab off Highway 89.

16. Zion Narrows from the Bottom, Springdale You wade upstream through the Virgin River between 2,000-foot canyon walls and go as far as you want. No permit needed for the bottom-up route, and the light in late morning is something else.

17. Little Wild Horse Canyon, Emery County A slot canyon loop near Goblin Valley that rivals anything in the Southwest and gets a fraction of the visitors. The slot sections are tight, the walls glow orange, and you can do the full loop in about 4 hours.

18. Goblin Valley State Park Thousands of mushroom-shaped sandstone formations in the San Rafael Swell, and unlike most parks, you can scramble all over them without staying on a trail. It's one of the few places left in Utah where you can just roam.

19. Bryce Canyon at Sunrise The hoodoos turn from pink to gold to orange in about 20 minutes at Sunrise Point. Most people sleep in. Don't.

20. Capitol Reef Orchards, Torrey Mormon pioneers planted fruit orchards in the 1800s and the park still maintains them. In season (June through October), you can pick your own apricots, peaches, pears, and apples directly from the trees for a small fee.

21. The Wave, Coyote Buttes North A sandstone rock formation on the Utah/Arizona border with striped, flowing lines that look like frozen water. Access is lottery-only with 64 permits per day — apply at recreation.gov well in advance.

22. Hell's Backbone Road, Boulder A 38-mile dirt road connecting Boulder to Escalante over a ridgeline with 1,000-foot drops on both sides and no guardrails. It's a gravel road you can manage in most vehicles and the views rival anything on a paved highway.

23. Hell's Backbone Grill, Boulder A farm-to-table restaurant on a working organic farm in a town of 200 people. The menu changes with the seasons and the sourcing is serious — the co-owners have been operating it since 1999.

24. Mazza, Salt Lake City A two-time James Beard Award finalist serving Lebanese food on 15th South. The baba ganoush, kabseh, and fresh pita are the reason it's been packed for over 25 years.

25. The Sego Restaurant, Thompson Springs A chef-driven restaurant inside a converted gas station in a near-ghost town off I-70 east of Green River. The food is legitimately excellent and the setting makes no sense, which is the whole point.

26. Whiptail Grill, Moab A converted gas station with a covered patio serving New Mexican-influenced food and good margaritas. The green chile is the real deal and the price point is reasonable for Moab.

27. Taqueria 27, Salt Lake City Upscale tacos with combinations like duck confit and grilled pear that actually work. They add a new taco of the day every single day, so repeat visits are built in.

28. Hub & Spoke Diner, Salt Lake City The best chicken and waffles in the state, made with sweet-tea-brined fried chicken on sweet potato waffles with chile maple syrup. It's not flashy, it's just very good.

29. Fillings & Emulsions Bakery, Salt Lake City An eclectic Latin bakery with a French technique, run by a chef who started baking at age 9. Unusual flavor combinations, high quality, and the kind of place you tell people about.

30. Chez Betty, Park City One of the oldest restaurants in Park City, tucked inside a historic building, serving French-influenced Utah cuisine. It's the opposite of the chain restaurants that have taken over Main Street.

31. The Pie Pizzeria, Salt Lake City A basement pizza spot on 1300 South that's been there since 1980. The booths are covered in graffiti from decades of University of Utah students, the slices are big, and the cheese sticks are mandatory.

32. La Caille, Sandy A French restaurant built on a 20-acre property at the mouth of Little Cottonwood Canyon with vineyards, gardens, and swans. It's been there 50 years and the food holds up.

33. Black Sheep Cafe, Provo Native American-influenced food in downtown Provo with dishes built around Navajo and Pueblo ingredients. The wild rice burger is the one to get.

34. Bar à Vin, Salt Lake City A wine bar with an award-winning charcuterie board featuring local Utah meats and cheeses, candied walnuts, and solid pours. Opened in 2024 and already has regulars.

35. Gilgal Sculpture Garden, Salt Lake City A small sculpture garden hidden between houses on 800 East featuring a sphinx with Joseph Smith's head, scripture-carved stones, and the general vibe of someone's very personal belief system made physical. It's free and open to the public.

36. Hole-in-the-Rock, Moab A 14-room home carved directly into a massive sandstone rock by Albert Christensen, who spent 12 years on it. His wife Gladys ran it as a trading post and gift shop for decades after he died.

37. Lilly E. Gray's Grave, Salt Lake City Cemetery A headstone in the Salt Lake City Cemetery that reads "Victim of the Beast 666." Nobody agrees on what it means. The woman buried there died in 1958 and the story of how that inscription ended up there remains genuinely unexplained.

38. Saltair Ruins, Great Salt Lake The decaying remnants of what was once called "the Coney Island of the West" on the south shore of the Great Salt Lake. The current building replaced the original after arson, and now it mostly hosts concerts and ghost stories.

39. Camp Floyd, Fairfield A forgotten military post from 1858 where 3,500 U.S. soldiers were stationed to keep an eye on Utah's Mormon settlers. Today it's a tiny state park in an even tinier town with a cemetery and a stagecoach inn still standing.

40. John Wesley Powell River History Museum, Green River The best-presented small museum in Utah, covering Powell's two expeditions down the Green and Colorado Rivers in the 1800s. Green River is a stopover most people drive through — stop here.

41. Utah Field House of Natural History, Vernal A dinosaur museum in a town that genuinely has dinosaurs in its backyard. The state park version of the American Museum of Natural History for the price of a few dollars.

42. This Is the Place Heritage Park, Salt Lake City A living history museum at the mouth of Emigration Canyon where the Mormon pioneers first entered the Salt Lake Valley. The monument itself is big, the historical village behind it is where the real time gets spent.

43. I-80 Wildlife Overpass, Parleys Canyon The largest wildlife crossing in Utah — a wide vegetated bridge over six lanes of I-80 that lets deer, elk, and other animals safely cross. You can watch it from the road or from a pull-off nearby. Most people have no idea it's there.

44. Metaphor: The Tree of Utah (restated for clarity) See #3 above — worth the double-mention because people still miss it completely driving between Salt Lake and Nevada.

45. Dark Sky Stargazing, Capitol Reef or Natural Bridges Natural Bridges National Monument was the world's first International Dark Sky Park. Capitol Reef is also certified. Both are in parts of Utah so remote that on a clear night you can see the Milky Way as a physical structure, not just a hazy line.

46. Solstice at Hovenweep, Montezuma Creek Ancestral Puebloan towers built to align with the sun on solstices and equinoxes in the Four Corners area. Rangers sometimes lead evening programs during solstice events and the site has almost no foot traffic compared to Mesa Verde.

47. Floating the Green River, Moab A self-guided float through Labyrinth Canyon with no whitewater, red canyon walls, and total silence. You put in at Green River State Park and take out at Mineral Bottom — it's 2 to 5 days depending on your pace and one of the best river trips in the Southwest.