15 Fun Things To Do In Gilbert That Every Parent Should Know

Gilbert's history is written in its soil. Founded in the early 1900s along the Arizona Eastern Railway, the town grew from a small siding into the “Hay Shipping Capital of the World,” its fields feeding cattle across the Southwest. Life revolved around irrigation canals, barns, and the steady rhythm of agriculture. Families gathered for church socials, schoolhouse events, and harvest fairs, building a close-knit community rooted in work and faith.

As the decades passed, Gilbert transformed. Farms gave way to neighborhoods, and dusty main streets became bustling cultural centers. Yet the town never lost sight of its origins. Parks stand where fields once stretched, farmers markets recall the earliest trade in produce, and even modern neighborhoods like Agritopia preserve the spirit of the family farm. To walk Gilbert today is to see history layered into daily life—where barns, schools, and irrigation ditches gave rise to theaters, libraries, and observatories, each carrying forward the town’s character.

Let's break down the best things to do in Gilbert

1. Riparian Preserve at Water Ranch

📍 Location: 2757 E Guadalupe Rd, Gilbert, AZ 85234

The Riparian Preserve at Water Ranch tells the story of how Gilbert transformed from an agricultural town into a community mindful of conservation. Once known as the “Hay Shipping Capital of the World,” Gilbert depended on irrigation canals and wells to support its vast fields. The preserve, opened in 1999, reflects that heritage—combining water management with wildlife preservation.

The site is built around recharge basins that replenish the town’s groundwater supply, but it doubles as a sanctuary for more than 300 species of birds. In the early days of Gilbert, wetlands and waterways were crucial for both farming and settlement; the preserve recreates that environment while serving as a public park.

2. Explore Downtown Gilbert

📍 Location: 50 E Civic Center Dr, Gilbert, AZ 85296

Downtown Gilbert, known as the Heritage District, is the heart of the town’s history. When Gilbert was founded in the early 1900s along the Arizona Eastern Railway, this stretch of road quickly filled with general stores, banks, and cafés that served local farmers. The town grew slowly, rooted in agriculture and community rather than industry.

Many of the early 20th-century buildings remain, now restored as restaurants, shops, and theaters. Murals and historic markers tell the story of Gilbert’s transformation from a railroad siding to one of Arizona’s fastest-growing towns.

Exploring downtown today, you walk the same streets where early settlers traded hay and produce, but you also see how Gilbert has reinvented itself as a cultural hub while preserving its small-town character.

3. Discover Agritopia

📍 Location: 3000 E Ray Rd, Gilbert, AZ 85296

Listed among top attractions in Gilbert, Agritopia is one of the most creative, community-driven spaces you’ll find anywhere in Arizona. It's more than just a neighborhood—it's a working farm, a food lover’s paradise, and a total escape from the suburban norm.

At the heart of Agritopia is a certified organic farm surrounded by tree-lined streets, locally owned businesses, and some truly standout places to eat. You’ll find farm-to-table meals at Joe’s Farm Grill, fresh coffee at The Coffee Shop, and handmade goods at Barnone—a collection of artist-driven micro-businesses set in a repurposed Quonset hut.

It’s the kind of place where you can walk between dinner, drinks, and a local market, all while feeling like you’ve stepped into a curated community from a design magazine. Everything is accessible, thoughtfully laid out, and full of charm. You can even tour the farm, take a gardening class, or pick up locally grown produce right on-site.

4. Enjoy Freestone Park

📍 Location: 1045 E Juniper Ave, Gilbert, AZ 85234

Freestone Park, Gilbert’s first major community park, opened in 1988 on land that once supported farming. For decades, Gilbert’s open fields produced hay and cotton, feeding livestock and fueling its reputation as a quiet farming town. As suburban growth spread in the late 20th century, the need for public recreational space led to the creation of Freestone Park.

Its lakes, playgrounds, and sports fields reflect the town’s transition from rural to suburban. Where fields once stretched, now families gather for picnics, joggers circle paths, and children ride miniature trains. Yet the park retains echoes of Gilbert’s agricultural past, with its wide-open landscapes and water features recalling the irrigation canals that once defined the land.

5. Tour the Gilbert Historical Museum

📍 Location: 10 S Gilbert Rd, Gilbert, AZ 85296

The Gilbert Historical Museum, housed in the town’s original elementary school built in 1913, is the keeper of Gilbert’s past. The red-brick building itself is a relic, standing since the days when Gilbert was little more than farmland connected by dirt roads and the railroad. Inside, exhibits trace the town’s journey from a quiet hay-shipping community to one of Arizona’s fastest-growing suburbs.

Photographs, farming equipment, and oral histories tell of the families who built the town, the role of the railroad in shaping its destiny, and the cultural shifts that came with growth. The museum also preserves military history, honoring Gilbert residents who served in wars abroad. Touring it feels less like browsing artifacts and more like walking through the layers of a community’s memory.

6. Experience Hale Centre Theatre

📍 Location: 50 W Page Ave, Gilbert, AZ 85233

The Hale Centre Theatre brings performing arts into the heart of Gilbert, but its story reflects a deeper tradition of community theater in America. Founded by the Hale family in Utah in the 1940s, the company expanded to Arizona in 2003, choosing Gilbert’s Heritage District as its stage.

The theater’s presence in downtown mirrors the role performance halls once played in small towns—bringing people together for storytelling, music, and shared imagination. Its intimate, in-the-round design connects audiences with actors the way early 20th-century town theaters did, when entertainment was personal and civic pride was tied to local productions.

For Gilbert, Hale Centre Theatre marks the shift from an agricultural town to a cultural hub, proof that history here is not only plowed into fields but performed under lights.

7. Wander through SanTan Village

📍 Location: 2218 E Williams Field Rd, Gilbert, AZ 85295

SanTan Village, an open-air shopping center, reflects Gilbert’s suburban transformation in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Once, commerce here revolved around feed stores, dairies, and small-town main streets. As Gilbert grew into a city, its retail needs shifted, leading to developments like SanTan Village in 2007—Arizona’s first “power lifestyle center.”

Though modern in design, it tells a story of change: the move from rural trade and mom-and-pop shops to large-scale retail that catered to a booming population. In its wide promenades and public spaces, you can still see echoes of the role marketplaces always played in Gilbert’s history—places to gather, exchange, and socialize, just on a different scale.

8. Relax at the Gilbert Farmers Market

📍 Location: 222 N Ash St, Gilbert, AZ 85234

Farmers markets are not new to Gilbert—they are a revival of its earliest identity. In the early 1900s, families sold hay, cotton, and produce directly from wagons and stalls, supplying both locals and the growing city of Phoenix. Agriculture was the town’s lifeblood, and markets were its social centers.

The modern Gilbert Farmers Market, held downtown, carries that legacy forward. Local growers, bakers, and artisans set up stalls much like their predecessors did a century ago. In a city that has grown rapidly, the market is a reminder of Gilbert’s roots: a community where farming was more than an industry—it was a way of life.

9. Visit the Gilbert Temple

📍 Location: 3301 S Greenfield Rd, Gilbert, AZ 85297

The Gilbert Arizona Temple of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, dedicated in 2014, reflects the lasting influence of Mormon settlers in the region. In the late 19th century, Latter-day Saint families were among those who helped develop irrigation systems and farmland in the Salt River Valley, laying the foundation for communities like Gilbert to thrive.

The temple, with its soaring spire and detailed craftsmanship, is a modern landmark but rooted in that pioneer history. It symbolizes both continuity and growth—linking the agricultural beginnings of Mormon settlers to Gilbert’s current identity as a city of faith, family, and community. For many residents, it stands not just as a house of worship, but as a visible reminder of the religious and cultural currents that helped shape the town’s character.

10. Attend a Festival or Event

Festivals have always been at the center of Gilbert’s community life. In its early years, barn dances, church socials, and harvest fairs offered relief from hard farm work, strengthening ties between neighbors. These gatherings defined the rhythm of the town, blending necessity with celebration.

Today, Gilbert carries that tradition forward with events like Gilbert Days, which celebrates the town’s western and agricultural roots with parades, rodeos, and music. Seasonal festivals—whether food, art, or cultural celebrations—recreate the sense of community that once revolved around harvests and town gatherings.

These events are more than entertainment; they are echoes of the past, proof that Gilbert’s history of community togetherness still shapes how it celebrates today.

11. Play at Topgolf Gilbert

📍 Location: 1689 S Santan Village Pkwy, Gilbert, AZ 85295

Topgolf may seem thoroughly modern, but even here Gilbert’s history lingers. Recreational clubs and sports fields have long been part of the town’s development. As early as the 1930s and ’40s, farmers’ sons and daughters played baseball on dusty fields carved out of hay land, while adults gathered at social clubs that combined sport with community.

Topgolf reflects the evolution of that tradition. Instead of farm fields, visitors now gather in a high-tech driving range with microchipped golf balls and neon targets. Yet the essence is familiar: recreation as a way of bringing people together. From harvest-time games to digital scoreboards, the underlying story is the same—sports and leisure have always been woven into Gilbert’s community fabric.

12. Explore the Southeast Regional Library

📍 Location: 775 N Greenfield Rd, Gilbert, AZ 85234

The Southeast Regional Library, set beside the Riparian Preserve, reflects Gilbert’s growth from small town to cultural hub. Early settlers relied on traveling book wagons and schoolhouse libraries, where collections were modest but vital for education in rural Arizona.

With its opening in 1999, the library marked a turning point: Gilbert was no longer just an agricultural community, but a suburban city with a need for cultural and educational resources. Its design, overlooking water and trails, connects knowledge to the natural and historical roots of the town.

Today, the library continues a tradition that began in one-room schoolhouses—providing learning, gathering, and imagination for every generation.

13. Explore Discovery Park

📍 Location: 2214 E Pecos Rd, Gilbert, AZ 85297

Discovery Park sits on land that once supported agriculture, the very foundation of Gilbert’s early life. When the town was known as the “Hay Shipping Capital of the World,” this area was covered in fields that fed the valley’s livestock. As farming gave way to suburban growth, Gilbert sought to preserve open space for recreation while honoring its agricultural roots.

Opened in 2006, the park’s wide fields and fishing ponds echo the openness of old farmland. Its name—Discovery—suggests both exploration and memory, inviting residents to discover leisure on ground that once sustained labor. It reflects Gilbert’s transition from work rooted in soil to a lifestyle centered on community parks, festivals, and family recreation.

14. Visit the Gilbert Rotary Centennial Observatory

📍 Location: 2757 E Guadalupe Rd, Gilbert, AZ 85234

Astronomy in Gilbert may seem far from hay fields, yet the observatory connects the town to broader traditions of science and civic life. Opened in 2006 as a partnership between the town and the local Rotary Club, the observatory celebrates both Gilbert’s centennial and humanity’s enduring fascination with the stars.

In earlier times, Arizona settlers relied on the night sky for navigation and planting cycles. The observatory formalizes that connection, offering telescopes and educational programs that bring the cosmos closer. It reminds visitors that Gilbert’s story is not only about the land beneath their feet but also about the skies above that guided generations.

15. Let the Dogs Loose at Cosmo Dog Park

📍 Location: 2502 E Ray Rd, Gilbert, AZ 85296

Named for Gilbert’s first police dog, Cosmo Dog Park highlights the modern role of pets in community life. Yet even this ties to history: in Gilbert’s farming days, dogs were indispensable as herders, guardians, and companions. They patrolled barns, protected cattle, and were part of the daily rhythm of agricultural families.

When Cosmo Park opened in 2006, it reflected both a tribute to service animals and a continuation of that bond. With lakes, play areas, and fields, it’s a space where dogs are not just helpers but celebrated members of the community. In this way, Cosmo Dog Park links Gilbert’s working past with its suburban present, honoring the animals that have always been by its side.

Conclusion

Gilbert is more than a fast-growing suburb; it is a place where history shapes the present. Its agricultural roots remain visible in preserved farms, farmers markets, and community spaces, while its cultural landmarks—museums, theaters, festivals, and parks—show how the town has redefined itself without letting go of its past.

From the irrigation canals that sustained its first crops to the observatories that now point toward the stars, Gilbert tells a story of continuity through change. It is a town where hayfields became neighborhoods, where barns became museums, and where traditions of gathering, faith, and hard work remain woven into everyday life.

To explore Gilbert is to witness a community that honors its beginnings even as it embraces its future—an Arizona town rooted in heritage, yet always reaching forward.

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FAQ

1. How far is Gilbert AZ from Phoenix?

Gilbert is approximately 22 miles southeast of downtown Phoenix, which is about a 30-minute drive depending on traffic.

2. What is Gilbert AZ known for?

Gilbert is known for its family-friendly atmosphere, vibrant Downtown Gilbert, outdoor attractions like the Riparian Preserve at Water Ranch, and its rich agricultural history, especially in areas like Agritopia.

3. Is Gilbert AZ worth visiting?

Absolutely! Gilbert offers a great mix of outdoor activities, cultural attractions, delicious dining options, and community events, making it a fun destination for all types of visitors.

4. What are the best things to do in Gilbert for families?

Families can enjoy plenty of activities in Gilbert, such as visiting Freestone Park for playgrounds and sports, playing at Topgolf Gilbert, or exploring the Gilbert Historical Museum for a bit of history.

5. When is the best time to visit Gilbert AZ?

The best time to visit Gilbert is in the spring (March to May) or fall (September to November), when temperatures are mild and outdoor activities are more enjoyable.

6. How is the weather in Gilbert AZ?

Gilbert experiences a desert climate, with hot summers often reaching over 100°F (38°C), and mild winters where temperatures range from 40°F to 70°F (4°C to 21°C).

7. What are some free things to do in Gilbert AZ?

Free activities in Gilbert include exploring the Riparian Preserve, wandering through Downtown Gilbert, attending the Gilbert Farmers Market, and visiting local parks like Freestone Park.