Bloomington Country Club

Bloomington Country Club is the oldest private club in southern Utah and the second golf course
ever built in the region, after Dixie Red Hills. It was founded in 1969 between the red cliffs of
Bloomington and a bend of the Virgin River, and it established the model - a private equity club at
the center of a residential community - that most of the valley's later golf neighborhoods copied.

The course

William H. Neff designed it, and it plays to a par of 72. Neff's routing is a product of its era in
the best sense: tree-lined corridors, bunkering that matters more than water, and greens that reward
a player who can control trajectory. From the back tees it rates 72.7 with a slope of 130. The course
has been remodeled since its founding, but the essential shape and the parkland character have been
kept.

The trees

What separates Bloomington from every other course in Washington County is the canopy. Fifty-odd
years of growth in a river bottom with reliable water has produced a genuinely mature tree cover,
and the result plays and feels nothing like the exposed desert courses on the benches above. Shade
is a real strategic factor, corridors are tight, and the temperature on the course in summer is
measurably lower than at Sand Hollow or Sky Mountain.

Access

Bloomington is a private, member-owned equity club - play is for members and their guests. It is not
the area's only private club; Entrada at Snow Canyon
is also private. Bloomington's distinction is that it was first, by nearly three decades.

The setting

The Bloomington neighborhood was laid out in a circle around the club, which is why the street pattern
on this part of the south end looks unlike anything else in St. George. The Virgin River runs along the
eastern edge, and the black basalt boulders on the ridge above the community carry one of the densest
concentrations of rock art in the area, protected at
Bloomington Petroglyph Park.

Living here

The Bloomington community remains one of the most
established addresses in the city, with large lots and mature landscaping that newer subdivisions
cannot replicate. Golfers driving in from Nevada will find the club is the first course they reach -
see St. George from Las Vegas for the approach.