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Less of a garden and more of an outdoor museum; the ATK Rocket Garden is a collection of rockets, rocket parts (booster, motors) and missiles arranged as an outdoor museum. Each rocket has a sign explaining its scientific statistics and use.
When to go: Year round
How long: 1-2 hours depending on how many signs you read.
Planning tip: Coordinate your visit to the rocket garden with a visit to Golden Spike National Monument and/or the Spiral Jetty.
Inside scoop: The rocket garden is an outdoor exhibit and part of the ATK grounds. It doesn’t have formal operating hours so you don’t need to worry about making it on a specific date or time. The rocket garden is 2 miles past the turn off to Promontory Summit where the Golden Spike National Monument is located. If you turn early you’ll miss it.
Where is it?
Located on Promontory Rd, about a 40 min drive from Brigham City and 2 miles west from the turn-off to Promontory Summit. Follow the signs to the Rocket Garden as you pass the Promontory Summit turn-off.
Where to stay in Spring City?
Hotels/Motels
The closest areas for accommodation are Brigham City, Tremonton, and Honeyville for both hotel/motel stays and camping.
Camping
If you love camping in state parks like we do, Willard Bay State Park is only a 40min drive from this area.
Where to eat?
Unfortunately, the nearest restaurants are in Brigham City or Tremonton and it’s easy to spend more time in this area than you bargained for. Pack a lunch and snacks so you’ll have a great visit and not feel rushed to get back!
What to do at the ATK Rocket Garden?
The Museum
We made it to the ATK Rocket Garden in the afternoon. Admittedly, we were a bit confused with how to get here and google maps got confused on our drive out. Our key learning was to pass the turnoff to Promontory summit where the Golden Spike National Historic Site is located and continue for about 2 miles. You’ll pass sign directing you to the garden shortly after the turn off.
The ATK rocket garden is an outdoor museum showcasing rockets, missiles, and rocket parts. Each piece of equipment on display has a sign explaining what it is, its use, and technical specifications. Pretty neat, especially if you’re into rockets, planes, and military stuff in general.
Take this space shuttle booster separation motor for example. Who knew this thing had a burn time less than 1 second! That’s just crazy. It’s even more interesting to be able to see a booster that is used in the space shuttle up close and personal.
The kids were sleeping when we got to the ATK rocket garden so we got to wander on our own for a bit. Don’t panic – we left all the doors to the car open, we were the only ones there, and parking is super close to the rocket garden so we could see them. They woke up not long after we arrived and wanted to walk around as well.
I mean, who can resist checking this place out when one of the largest rockets literally has NASA written on it! Troy’s super strong lifting that rocket up all by himself.
Geocaching
The Geocaching Tour of Utah had a geocache here earlier this summer. It’s actually the cache that kick started our whirlwind tour through 29 counties this summer.
Sadly the geocaching tour of Utah has now ended, but you can still check out some of the caches.
We loved this particular cache because you needed to search for information through the ATK rocket garden to be able to open the cache. Searching for information is always a great way to really experience a museum rather than rushing through so we are huge proponents of these caches!
