Utah is best known for its natural beauty, from snow-capped peaks to spectacular red rock formations. Groups that want to incorporate the great outdoors into their meetings can have their pick of some of Utah’s most renowned destinations.
Park City
Park City is a ski resort destination that was founded in the 1860s as a silver mining town on the eastern side of the Wasatch Mountains. The city is also a winter Olympic sports destination.
Skiing and winter sports are a big draw, but in the spring, summer and fall, Park City is a prime hiking, biking, river rafting, fly fishing and ATV destination. More than 200 restaurants, art galleries, bars and boutiques line its historic Main Street.
The area’s 26 meeting properties have, on average, 4,000 to 6,000 square feet of event space. For action, planners book Utah Olympic Park, which offers bobsledding, ziplines, an alpine slide, guided tours and the opportunity to see Olympians in training. The property has several event spaces including the Summer Pavilion, for banquets of 200, or the Quinney Welcome Center.
The Pendry Park City is the newest hotel in town, with 153 guest rooms and 8,000 square feet of indoor event space, including a 5,500-square-foot ballroom. Guests have ski-in/ski-out access to the resort’s 7,300 acres. Other favorites include Montage Deer Valley, The St. Regis Deer Valley and the Waldorf Astoria Park City. In the mid-price range, Chateaux Deer Valley, Hyatt Place, Sheraton and Double Tree are great options.
The Kimball Art Center on Main Street is an attractive venue for smaller groups, and the DeJoria Center at High Star Ranch, High West Distillery and River Bottoms Ranch are great offsite venues.
Kanab
Kanab is nestled among three national parks: Zion, Bryce Canyon and the Grand Canyon’s North Rim, which makes it a great base for meeting groups that want to explore those parks. This quaint historical town is also a short drive from three national monuments, two state parks and a national recreation area. Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, Glen Canyon National Recreation Area and Coral Pink Sand Dunes State Park are about 20 minutes from town.
More than 250 movies have been filmed in and around Kanab, and the 89-room historic Parry Lodge has a rich history of serving casts and crews, including John Wayne, Sammy Davis Jr., Frank Sinatra, Clint Eastwood and other Hollywood Legends. Many guest rooms are named after stars.
The Kanab Center, the town’s primary convention center is surrounded by red rock cliffs and the setting is so beautiful that many breakout groups end up outdoors and take hikes on nearby trails or venture to White Pocket Trailhead so they can walk through windswept layers of orange, yellow and white rock formations.
The 81-room Hampton Inn is the closest hotel to the Kanab Center, but Comfort Suites, Holiday Inn Express and Suites Kanab, and La Quinta Inn and Suites by Wyndham Kanab are all within walking distance.
North Event Center, the area’s newest venue, has two gyms that can accommodate 330 people each, two small conference rooms and a Dance Room for up to 150.
Provo
Provo is in the Utah Valley, near some of the state’s most notable natural attractions, including Bridal Veil Falls, Mount Timpanogos and Utah Lake State Park, home of the state’s largest freshwater lake. There are plenty of opportunities for hiking, fishing, swimming, boating or paddle boarding.
Downtown Provo’s local shops and restaurants attract visitors, including those who meet at the nearby Utah Valley Convention Center. The convention center’s 83,578 square feet of event space, includes a large exhibit hall and ballroom. Nearby, the 329-room Provo Marriott Hotel and Conference Center has 32,733 square feet of meeting space in 20 rooms including its 8,142-square-foot grand ballroom. The nearby Hyatt Place-Provo has 133 rooms and 2,589 square feet of meeting space.
Nearby on Mount Timpanogos, Sundance Mountain Resort has 95 guest cottages and 10 mountain homes, 12,000 square feet of flexible meeting space and 5,000 acres of mountain wilderness to be explored. The new Epic Sports Park in the Utah Valley and its 15 multi-purpose fields is drawing sports groups. The property will add another six fields and 45 pickleball courts in the near future.
Moab
Moab is an outdoor enthusiast’s dream, with camping, off-roading, hiking, mountain biking, rafting, horseback riding, rock climbing, sky diving and base jumping. It is only a couple of miles from Arches National Park and near Canyonlands National Park and Sand Flats Recreation Area so it is a popular tourist destination.
Across 76,500 acres, Arches National Park contains more than 2,000 arches, the largest concentration of natural sandstone arches in the world. Canyonlands National Park’s huge expanse of red rock mesas and deep canyons makes it Utah’s largest national park.
Moab’s hotels have a total of 3,000 rooms, and several have meeting spaces. The 100-room Red Cliffs Lodge’s 10,000 square feet of event space includes the 4,500-square-foot Colorado Room with its elevated stage. An adjacent 1,300-square-foot private patio has amazing views of the Colorado River. The lodge’s river lawn can handle groups of up to 150.
Hoodoo Moab, Curio Collection by Hilton has 117 guest rooms and 4,477 square feet of meeting space, and the Element Moab can accommodate 275 guests in its largest meeting space. Homewood Suites Moab, Hyatt Place Moab and Hampton Inn all have event space. Because Moab is such a tourist mecca, meeting planners will have better luck if they book meetings or events during the area’s shoulder and off seasons.
St. George/Springdale
At the entrance to Zion National Park, Springdale packs its hotels with national park visitors, especially in high season, and several of its hotels have meeting space. Springdale also has plenty of dining and shopping within the shadows of Zion’s towering canyons and by staying there, visitors can park and ride a free shuttle that loops around town and to the park.
Hotel De Novo Springdale, a Hilton property, has 70 guest rooms and 2,610 square feet of meeting space. The only accommodations in the park, the 76-room Zion National Park Lodge, are very popular with leisure travelers and thus impractical for meeting groups.
Some 45 minutes from Zion, St. George is a good-sized city with an easy to navigate and historic downtown. Its Dixie Convention Center is the largest meeting space in the area, with 100,000 square feet of meeting space that includes a 46,550-square-foot column-free exhibit hall, 32,000 square feet of flexible meeting space, two board rooms and an auditorium. Four hotels are within walking distance and many others are within a 15-minute drive.
The Tuacahn Amphitheatre, a 1,996-seat outdoor performing arts center on St. George’s outskirts, can be booked for meetings or events. It is also a fun place to take in a concert or theater performance.
