Fit retirees hooked on southern Utah

ST. GEORGE — At daybreak on a recent morning, the average age on the Virgin River Trail hovered between AARP eligibility and Medicare beneficiary, settling in somewhere north of 60. As Bill Boulter biked up the mesquite-lined path in a 20-mile loop, he passed a parade of gray-bearded grandfathers on recumbent bicycles, silver-haired joggers covered in Lycra and liver spots, and power walkers with walking sticks.

"I call them raisins because they're all wrinkly and slow," said Boulter, 55 and a grandfather. "But I should talk. I'm rapidly becoming a raisin myself."

In the latest twist on retirement living, aging baby boomers are abandoning the surf-and-turf enclaves of Florida or Arizona in favor of fitness-minded enclaves where they can raft, rock-climb and hike well into old age. The new retirees are sort of a senior version of college-age ski bums, migrating to resort towns not to work but to play all day.

"They aren't getting their gold watch and sitting on a rocking chair," said Amber McCracken, a spokeswoman for the Alliance for Aging Research based in Washington.

And with 38 million older baby boomers nearing retirement age, communities catering to grizzled jocks are starting to emerge wherever the winters are mild, the land is relatively affordable and the great outdoors is a short hop away. Many have cropped up in the Pacific Northwest and the Rockies, places like Hood River, Ore.; Durango, Colo.; and other small resort towns that offer a dizzying array of outdoor activities.

"We see retirees as tourists who stay longer," said James Westkott, a state demographer for Colorado, which has had a surge of "interim retirees," affluent boomers who are enjoying active retirement in their 50s. "These places were developed as second-home communities but are now being turned into retirement communities."

Utah's boomtown

The trendsetter, however, may be Washington County and its hub city, St. George, in the southwest corner of Utah, near the Arizona and Nevada borders and two hours northeast of Las Vegas.

"It's the fastest-growing retirement community in the country," said John Burns, a real estate consultant from Irvine, Calif., who has written extensively about retirement migration.