Conveniently located inside the museum, a free visitor center allows our guests to get all the necessary information to fulfill their adventure in the Vernal area. Our friendly and knowledgeable staff is available year-round to answer questions and help enhance your visit. Visitors can get up-to-date information about attractions, recreational opportunities, food, lodging, as well as local events.

The Uinta Fossil Journey begins in the museum rotunda, where its sentry – the giant Diplodocus skeleton, 90 feet from tip to tail – looms about and greets visitors

A short film, Uinta Fossil Journey – Stories in Stone, takes visitors into the canyons along the drive to Vernal, and shows a day in the field at two fossil digs, one for the Jurassic period and another for the Eocene. The landscape comes alive with stories of past life.

Leaving the theater, a rock wall to the right contains a small ravine where visitors may try and distinguish fossils from among the washed out pebbles and debris. To the left, a dig site simulation illustrates the science and sequence of Jurassic fieldwork, including discovery and removal of fossils from rock. Everything changes in the Fossil Lab; visitors leave the field and enter a completely new phase of work, which includes worktables, lights, glasses, and tools. Pick up a bone and chisel, and prepare a fossil specimen.

The park is a showcase of eastern Utah’s geologic past and natural history. The main features are the museum and the Dinosaur Garden. A wealth of geologic, paleontologic, archaeologic and biologic specimens are displayed, reviewing the natural history of the Uinta Mountains and Uinta Basin.

Exhibits include nearly three billion years of earth history asit is exposed in the nearby Uinta Mountains and Uinta Basin. In the geology hall, fossils are displayed from rocks covering more than 600 million years of life, ranging from algae to dinosaurs to highly advanced mammals. Artistic representations of these life forms, plus the geology of the area painted by G.E. Untermann Sr. (father of the original director of the Field House), are displayed throughout the museum.

The anthropology hall includes examples of ancient and recent Native American life in the Uintas. Highlighted are the works of the Fremont Indians, a group that lived in this areafrom approximately 700 to 1250 AD. Reproductions of local rock art are displayed throughout the room. In addition there is a section that emphasizes Ute handicrafts and cultural items.

In the natural history hall, examples of local animal life are arranged along a mural depicting life as one descends from the high Uinta Mountains into the Uinta Basin. Outside the museum is the Dinosaur Garden, 17 full-size replicas of prehistoric animals ranging in age from the Pennsylvanian through the Pleistocene. Most of these animals were sculpted by Elbert Porter and bought by the state of Utah for the Field House in 1977. A new addition, Ceolophysis, a Triassicdinosaur made by artist David Thomas, was purchased in 1993.