Mill Creek Canyon

Mill Creek Canyon overflows with outdoor adventure. Visitors can enjoy Mill Creek and the stunning views of the Wasatch Mountains and the impressive canyon scenery. Located just minutes from Salt Lake City along the Wasatch Front, Mill Creek Canyon hosts an average of 1,400 visitors daily.

Mill Creek Canyon delivers it all: breathtaking hikes along the creek, nearby peaks and thick forests, outstanding overlooks, and recreational escapes. Visitors indulge in multilevel hiking trails, mountain biking, picnicking, cross-country skiing, snowshoeing, fat biking, and sledding.

A blend of sandstone, limestone, and fault scarps reveals tales of glaciers from more than 30,000 years ago.

Many of Mill Creek Canyon’s trails cross private land known as inholdings (private land within public land). A number of these inholdings were old mining claims owned by the Boy Scouts of America that lie within the Uinta-Wasatch-Cache National Forest.

Trust for Public Land and many partners collaborated with the Boy Scouts of America to purchase the land by adding it to the national forest. Protecting Mill Creek Canyon advances TPL’s long-standing goal to expand the Bonneville Shoreline Trail (BST) and protect iconic properties along the trail.

Mill Creek Canyon expands the ever-popular Bonneville Shoreline Trail by 27 miles. TPL conveyed the land to the Uinta-Wasatch-Cache National Forest, which now manages the new lands for recreation and wildlife.

“These are the places that are favorite hiking destinations for people, and they don’t realize there are segments that are private land. They take for granted there will always be trail access, but that can change overnight,” said Greg Hiner, TPL’s director of southwest land protection. “It’s close-to-home recreation for so many people, and it will be more important the more the city grows.”