Photo courtesy St. George CTA
Where is St. George, Utah?
St. George is a town of 65,000 in the western corner of the state near the Arizona border. Las Vegas is a 90-minute drive to the southwest; Salt Lake City is 4.5 hours northeast.
How do we get there?
Shuttle services are available from Las Vegas, the closest major airport, and from Salt Lake City. St. George’s new airport also offers daily commercial flights. (See more under “What’s New?”)
What types of meetings best suit
St. George?
St. George’s mild climate combined with ample options for outdoor activities draws corporate retreats, traditional meetings, tradeshows and sports events.
Did you know?
• St. George is called Utah’s Dixie because Mormon settlers found the mild climate conducive to cotton crops.
• Western North America’s most significant dinosaur track site is in St. George.
• “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” and “The Electric Horseman” are among the movies filmed in St. George.
Tell me about the main meeting venues.
• St. George is home to the Dixie Center, a convention center with a 46,000-square-foot exhibit hall, 19 meeting rooms, a theater, two boardrooms and a large lobby. The complex can accommodate crowds as large as 5,000 people. A 150-room Hilton Garden Inn with 4,000 square feet of meeting space is adjacent to the center.
• Other major convention properties include the Lexington Hotel and Suites, with 164 rooms, 5,000 square feet of interior meeting space and another 4,000 square feet in a tented area, and the 155-room Best Western Abbey Inn, with 4,300 square feet of meeting space.
• Among the area’s newest properties is the 131-room Courtyard by Marriott St. George, which has about 4,000 square feet of meeting space.
• Two spa resorts, Green Valley Spa and Resort in St. George and Red Mountain Spa in nearby Ivins, are possibilities for retreats and small meetings. Of note, the St. George convention bureau is offering a hot-stone massage at Red Mountain for meeting planners who book a new event in St. George.
Tell me about some great places for off-site events.
• The restored St. George Opera House is now the centerpiece for the Center for the Arts, a complex that also includes the St. George Art Museum.
• The possibilities are wide at Green Gate Village Historic Inn, 14 historic buildings that have been combined into a village in downtown St. George. Groups can have barbecues and picnics on the village green or meals in some of the historic homes and other buildings.
Tell me about some sites to be seen.
• Zion National Park, the state’s oldest national park and its busiest, is 40 miles from St. George. The park’s sandstone towers, slot canyons and cliffs are the result of eons of erosion. Roads that wind through the park make driving tours an option for those short on time and energy; those with more time will want to take off down some of the park’s dozens of trails.
• Nine miles north of St. George, Snow Canyon State Park and its volcanic cones, sand dunes, red sandstone cliffs and twisted rocks make people marvel at the forces of Mother Nature.
• See a Broadway show or a big-name performer at the 1,920-seat Tuacahn, where surround sound takes on new meaning when songs reverberate off 1,500-foot red rock cliffs in a box canyon.
What’s new?
• The new St. George Airport, opened in January, is expected to add options for travel into the area. Already, United, through Skywest, has added daily flights to and from Los Angeles. That’s in addition to daily service from Salt Lake City through Skywest’s partnership with Delta. The new airport’s runway is longer than that of the old, allowing airplanes as large as Boeing 737s to land there. The airport is five miles from St. George.
For a true taste of St. George…
Order your meat, not your drink, on the rocks at Anasazi Steakhouse. Hefty rib-eyes, New York strips and other steaks are delivered to tables on hot volcanic rocks so diners inhale the smells and hear the sizzles. To add sparkle to a night out, reserve a seat at the Painted Pony, declared “a jewel in the desert” by Zagat’s. Start with Kung Pao Chicken lollipops and quail and move on to the Moroccan Spiced Chicken or the Butternut Hazelnut Ravioli. There’s even a small room for semiprivate dinners.
There’s taxidermy on the walls and elk, buffalo and other wild game on the plate at Gun Barrel Steak and Game House.
Tell me about some extra-special
services provided by St. George’s
convention bureau.
When a convention group decided it wanted to hold a 5K fun run, sales manager Brittany McMichael worked with city officials to map out the course, obtain proper permits and enlist the help of safety officials.
877-752-9349
www.atozion.com
