There’s something about fall that gets me every year. The mornings turn crisp, everything smells like cinnamon and woodsmoke, and suddenly every weekend feels like it’s made for getting outside. The problem isn’t a lack of things to do around Salt Lake. It’s that the season moves fast, and if you’re not paying attention, half of it slips by before you’ve made it to a single one.
So, here’s what I’ve got lined up. A few old favorites, a couple I’m excited to try myself. Take your pick.
The Kinlands Pumpkin Patch
📍 The Kinlands, 11887 4000 W, Riverton
🗓️ September 12 through October 25, 2026
🕛 Monday to Thursday 11am–8pm, Friday and Saturday 10am–10pm, Sunday 10am–8pm
🎫 No admission fee. Wagon rides are $2 in the daytime, $5 after dark.
No gate and no ticket — you just walk in. There are 11 goats, three horses, two emus, two turkeys, eight chickens and two shop cats to go and see, plus swings, slides and a bean pool. A cottage called Prim sits at the entrance doing caramel apples, cider and cronuts, and the 4,000-square-foot Shoppe behind it carries cider donuts, pumpkin butter, sourdough and mulling spices. Jack-o’-lanterns run 55 cents a pound and the kaleidoscope pumpkins 99 cents — prices they’ve held for seven years now.
The after-dark wagon ride is the one to book. It runs out through the extended patch while you get told about the spirits of The Kinlands and the history of the land underneath it. There are two lots on site with the south one kept for overflow, and if you’re coming with a group, note that only two of you can go into the Shoppe at a time.
Cross E Ranch Fall Festival
📍 Cross E Ranch, 3500 N 2200 W, Salt Lake City
🗓️ September 18–19, then September 25 through October 31, 2026
🕛 Hours vary. Check before you go.
🎫 See the event page for current pricing.
This is an adventure farm rather than just a patch. Archery, zip lines, a rock wall, a ropes course, rat rollers, a barrel train, pony rides, hula cows, jumbo Jenga, a hay pyramid, corn pits, duck races, jump pads, slides and pig racing, all on top of the corn maze and the hay ride. There’s a Kiddie Korral for the smallest ones and face painting for everybody else.
Buy your tickets before you leave the house — they don’t sell at the gate at all. Part of the reason is that everyone signs the waiver in advance, and part of it is that having your details on file is how they reunite lost kids with their parents. The ranch office takes calls Monday to Thursday, 10 to 4, if you want to ask something first.
Kuwahara’s Pumpkin Patch & Thriller Park
📍 Kuwahara’s, 12153 South 700 West, Draper
🗓️ The pumpkin patch opens September 10, 2026. Thriller Park opens September 25 and runs through October 31.
🕛 Hours vary. Check before you go.
🎫 Day passes are sold online, separately for weekdays and weekends. 2026 prices aren’t posted yet.
More than 30 attractions spread across a pumpkin patch and a full Halloween park. There’s the Cornfield of Terror, a Jack O’Lantern Maze, Halloween Main Street, Cirque du Salt Lake, a Fairytale Kingdom, zombie paintball, fire dancing, bounce houses, a foam pit and a ball pit. The evenings alternate between two themes all season — Villainz Gamers & Monsters one night, Witches Pirates Zombies the next.
The daytime calendar is worth planning around: Cosplay Day on October 3, Boneyard Bash on the 10th and 11th, Little Witches & Wizards on the 17th and 18th, Super Hero Day on the 24th and 25th, and an 18-and-over Halloween party from 7 to 10 on the 31st. Passes are all-day and you can come and go from Thriller Park, but not from the pumpkin patch or the Cornfield of Terror — do those in one run. Tickets are tied to the date you pick and aren’t refundable.
Crazy Corn Maze
📍 Crazy Corn Maze, 8800 South 4000 West, West Jordan
🗓️ September 18 through October 31, 2026 — the 18th, 19th, 25th, 26th and 28th to 30th in September, then every day in October except Sundays. Fright Lights opens September 25.
🕛 Maze and courtyard Monday to Thursday 6:30pm–9:30pm, Friday and Saturday 6:30pm–11:30pm. Closed Sundays, and closing at 10:30 on Halloween.
🎫 See the event page for current pricing.
Four attractions on one site. The maze takes anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour and a half depending on whether you take on the checkpoint challenge, and there’s a Mini Maze for younger kids with an Animal Tracks game matching footprints to fall animals hidden through it. Fright Lights is a mile-long glowing walk through the pumpkin patch — music, fog-filled bubbles, dancing ghosts, a Candy Hall and a pumpkin to take home while they last — and Night Stalkers is the scary one, about 40 minutes through four zones themed around Feeding Day: the cornfields, Phobia, 3D Slumber and the Horror Show. The Festival Courtyard fills the gaps with corn hole, giant board games, a jumping pumpkin pad and a food court doing Grandma’s Famous Hot Chocolate, Monster Burgers and churro bites.
Every attraction ticket already includes the maze, so don’t pay for that separately. There are no paper maps — you scan a QR code at the entrance and the map and a GPS tracker come up on your phone, so turn up with some battery left. They close when it’s raining or the paths are still too muddy afterwards and post the call to their Instagram by 6pm on the day; service animals only, and no outside food or drink.
Mabey’s Pumpkin Patch
📍 Mabey Farms, 10090 S 1000 W, South Jordan
🗓️ 2026 dates aren’t posted yet — they open the last week of September and stay open through Halloween.
🕛 Monday to Saturday 10am–7:30pm. Closed Sundays.
🎫 Free to get in.
A working family farm that’s been in the same family since 1884, and one the state recognizes as a Utah Century Farm. The patch runs to more than 16 acres with over 45 varieties of pumpkin in it. They set up a barn-wood photo booth, a 12-foot hay rake, corn stalks, straw bales and wagons for pictures.
Free admission makes this the easy one to pull into on a whim — you’re only paying for what you carry out. School field trips are welcome with a reservation first, though they’ve stopped doing corporate events. It’s closed Sundays, which catches people out every year.
Wheeler Historic Farm — Pumpkin Days
📍 Wheeler Historic Farm, 6351 S 900 E, Murray
🗓️ September 25 through October 31, 2026
🕛 Pumpkin patch Monday to Thursday 10am–8pm, Friday and Saturday 9am–9pm, Sunday 9am–4pm. The maze and playland run 4pm–8pm on weekdays, 9am–9pm Friday and Saturday, 9am–4pm Sunday, with daytime openings from 10am on October 15, 19, 22 and 26, and 10am–4pm on Halloween.
🎫 The pumpkin patch is free — pumpkins are priced by size. The maze and playland is $12, which includes one wagon or cow train ride, or $10 for the maze alone. Tuesdays take $2 off. Under 2s free with a paying adult, and extra wagon or cow train rides are $3.
The county’s own farm, and the pumpkin patch half of it costs nothing — it sits in the north parking lot pasture and you pay by the size of whatever you carry out. The ticketed half is the family-friendly maze and the playland, and that ticket comes with a wagon or cow train ride around the farm. Wagon, cow train and Country Store tickets are sold at the Rosebud Country Store, the Activity Barn or the ticket booth.
Leashed, well-behaved dogs are welcome in the pumpkin patch, which is rarer than it should be among the patches around here. Tuesdays knock $2 off the maze and playland ticket, and there are four extra daytime openings — October 15, 19, 22 and 26 — if a weekday evening doesn’t work for you.
Utah State Fair
📍 Utah State Fairpark, 155 N 1000 W, Salt Lake City
🗓️ September 10–20, 2026
🕛 Hours vary. Check before you go.
🎫 $15 adults, $10 seniors 62 and over, $10 for ages 6–12, free under 6, or $60 for a season pass. No fees added on site.
Eleven days across 65 acres, with more than 150 years of history behind it. Competitive arts and crafts, livestock exhibitions, carnival rides, live entertainment, a run of vendors, and the fair food that’s half the reason anybody goes.
You’re allowed to bring your own food and drink in — coolers get searched at the gate, and there’s no glass, no cans and no outside alcohol. They stopped printing the daily schedule, so pull it up on the fair’s app or site once you’re through the gate. Guest services on the north side has first aid, the lost child area and a nursing room, and scooter rentals are just inside Gate Y at the north end.
Utah Honey Harvest Festival
📍 Clark Historic Farm, 392 West Clark Street, Grantsville
🗓️ Friday, October 9 and Saturday, October 10, 2026
🕛 Friday noon to 6pm, Saturday 10am to 6pm
🎫 $5 to get in
The twelfth year of this one, and it makes a fair claim to being the best signature fall event in the state. There’s world honey tasting and local honey to buy, beekeeping demonstrations and hands-on exhibits, more than 80 craft vendors, a petting zoo, bounce houses, honey contests and the Sweet Fiddlin’ Fest. At 5 on the Friday they crown the Honorary Queen Bees — women over 75 who’ve been a good influence on the community.
It’s about 35 minutes west of the city in Grantsville, one of Utah’s oldest pioneer towns, on a farm that’s on the National Register. Park on the street or at the park-and-ride on Main Street near the cemetery and ride the hay wagon shuttle in; accessible parking is on Clark Street right by the entrance. No pets except service animals, and the $5 goes back into keeping the farm standing.
That’s the list I’d hand a friend if they asked what’s worth doing this fall around Salt Lake. Some of these you’ve probably driven past a hundred times without stopping. This is the year you stop.
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