Things to do / Travel Guide
From strange stone sculptures to the Western hemisphere's largest man-made waterfall, from wild nature trails to meticulously-manicured gardens, northern Utah's botanical gardens are magical mixtures of glorious green.
University of Utah Campus Gardens and Arboretums
Red Butte Garden and Arboretum, on the University of Utah campus in Salt Lake City, will provide you with a colorful, sweet-smelling afternoon. Located on a semi-arid knoll, this “museum of living plants” is one of northern Utah's most-widely-regarded botanical gardens; spend an a few hours walking through it and you will see why. Red Butte's well-maintained 25-acres are divided between a medicinal garden, a diverse daylily collection, a perennial garden, a fragrance garden, and a children's garden. On trails crisscrossing 125 undeveloped acres you can also pay tribute to over 300 large and dwarf conifer trees. The gardens are open daily year-round.
Adjacent to Red Butte, also on the University of Utah campus, are the 1,500 acres of the State Arboretum of Utah. The arboretum's conservatory (open by appointment only) covers 1,100 square feet and contains more than 400 different plant varieties. You can walk at your leisure among the arboretum's over-8,000 trees, among which is one of the United States' largest collections of Russian Olive.
Northern Utah's Gilgal Garden
“Can I create a sanctuary or atmosphere in my yard that will shut out fear and keep one's mind young and alert to the last, no matter how perilous the times?” This was the challenge that founder Thomas Buttersby Child Jr. carved out for himself before creating Gilgal Garden, his sculpture garden sensation on East 500 South, right smack in the center of Salt Lake City. You can stroll amidst a Sphinx of Joseph Smith (founder of the Mormon movement), a huge Mormon cricket, scattered, sculpted body parts of biblical figures etched with scripture, as well as more than 70 poem-, quote-, and verse-inscribed stone slabs. The garden is open year-round and admission is free.
Utah Botanical Center
Expertly blending wild with tame, the Utah Botanical Center in Kaysville will give you that hard-to-find botanical mixture of unrestrained nature trails and carefully-pruned gardens. Featuring a Butterfly Garden, Blue Garden, Children's Discovery House, a prairie, and wildflower meadow, as well as ponds and wetlands frequented by blue herons and black-crowned night herons, a network of trails open dawn to dusk year-round allows you to stroll through this lush, open-air oasis.
Northern Utah's Thanksgiving Point Gardens
An unspoken gratitude may move your spirit as you wander through the 55 “amazing acres” at Thanksgiving Point Gardens in Lehi. Utah landscape architect Leonard Grassli has created a number of unique and gorgeous gardens inlcuding the Creek Garden, Monet Garden, Secret Garden, Waterfall Garden, Vista Garden, and the Children's Discovery Garden. Even adult visitors may very well feel as if they have stepped into a magical scene from Mary Poppins as they walk over the Monet Bridge, which stretches over a flower-bordered creek. As your visit's grand finale, you can stop off at the largest man-made waterfall in the Western Hemisphere, housed in the gardens' amphitheater and then sip tea or coffee in the Garden Trellis café as you absorb the sprawling green and varicolored fineries. Also on the grounds of Thanksgiving Point are a golf course, a historic village, the North American Museum of Ancient Life, and entertaining, educational Farm Country. The gardens are open year-round, Monday-Saturday.
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