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Golden Spike National Historical Park

24 March 2025 • 38 km / 24 mi (map)

  • Added to Eric Scouten :: Travel on 5 April 2025
  • Utah 19

Today our company took a company-wide holiday. I happened to be in Salt Lake City, so I decided to go visit Golden Spike National Historical Park, which commemorates the point at which the first transcontinental railroad was completed in 1869.

Ironically, most of the rail line no longer exists. A shorter and easier route was constructed a few decades later. Most of the iron in the rails was taken up and put to new use during the war effort in the 1940s.

A short bit of the rail line remains at Promontory and much of the old grade remains as it was originally constructed.

A wide expanse of dry golden grassland crossed by a barbed-wire fence under a vast blue sky, with snow-capped mountains rising along the distant horizon and a wispy vertical contrail dissolving overhead.
Big Fill and Big Trestle View, Golden Spike National Historical Park, west of Corinne, Utah
A brown entrance sign on a stacked-stone base reading “Golden Spike National Historical Park, National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior,” with an illustration of an old steam locomotive and the red arrowhead NPS emblem. Behind it stretch dry grasslands and rolling hills leading to snow-capped mountains under a clear blue sky.
Golden Spike National Historical Park, west of Corinne, Utah

During summer months, the park conducts a re-enactment of the meeting of the locomotives arriving from opposite sides. During the rest of the year, a team comprised largely of volunteer train enthusiasts lovingly maintains the steam engines (which are carefully-constructed replicas of the originals). Every so often, park visitors are invited to visit the Engine House where this maintenance occurs.

This was a highlight of the trip!

A historic steam locomotive numbered 119 displayed head-on inside a wooden engine house, showing its maroon cowcatcher pilot, large round black smokebox door, brass-trimmed headlamp, and tall smokestack. Behind it the colorful red, blue, and green “Jupiter” locomotive is partly visible in the dim, beam-roofed building with workbenches and equipment along the sides.
Engine House, Golden Spike National Historical Park, west of Corinne, Utah
Close-up of a restored steam locomotive’s large red driving wheel with a white-rimmed tire and a polished connecting rod, beneath a wooden cab bearing an ornate red and gold panel reading “No 119.” The engine sits indoors on rails marked by a yellow safety line in an engine house.
Engine House, Golden Spike National Historical Park, west of Corinne, Utah
Engine House, Golden Spike National Historical Park, west of Corinne, Utah
Engine House, Golden Spike National Historical Park, west of Corinne, Utah
Two railroad tracks converge in an X-shaped crossing in a flat, arid sagebrush landscape, with the foreground rails laid out separately on gravel ground. Rolling tan hills stretch across the horizon under a bright blue sky scattered with white clouds.
Engine House, Golden Spike National Historical Park, west of Corinne, Utah

The actual golden spike that was driven is no longer there, but a golden-colored tie has been placed at its location.

A single railroad track stretches straight toward the horizon across a flat, dry plain of pale brush, with one wooden tie painted yellow in the foreground and gray gravel ballast on either side. A bright blue sky with scattered white clouds tops the scene, and a paved walkway with a few distant visitors runs along the right side.
Golden Spike National Historical Park, west of Corinne, Utah

A portion of the rail grade that is no longer in service has been converted to a gravel “auto tour” road. I drove a short part of that tour route and enjoyed seeing what must have been a difficult route to build, given the technology of the time.

A gravel dirt road curves between a tall, jagged gray rock cut on the left and a lower embankment topped with dry sagebrush on the right, under a bright blue sky with scattered white clouds. Distant mountains are faintly visible on the horizon where the road leads.
East Grade Auto Tour, Golden Spike National Historical Park, west of Corinne, Utah
A gravel dirt road winds through a high desert landscape of dry grass and sagebrush, passing rocky outcrops under a blue sky scattered with white clouds, with snow-capped mountains faintly visible in the distance.
East Grade Auto Tour, Golden Spike National Historical Park, west of Corinne, Utah
A gravel road curves between two rocky outcrops in an arid high-desert landscape, with dry grass and sagebrush growing along the rugged stone banks under a bright blue sky dotted with white clouds.
East Grade Auto Tour, Golden Spike National Historical Park, west of Corinne, Utah
A rugged hillside of weathered gray rock outcrops dotted with dry sagebrush and scrubby desert vegetation under a bright blue sky filled with billowing white clouds. A faint dirt trail winds through the rocky, arid terrain.
East Grade Auto Tour, Golden Spike National Historical Park, west of Corinne, Utah
around Golden Spike National Historical Park, west of Corinne, Utah · 38 km / 24 mi
(Mouse over or tap on the markers to see the photos there. Use the button to adjust the map’s position and zoom.)

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