The Barton Springs Pool in Austin, Texas, attracted more visitors last year than it had during any year in the previous decade. The storied natural swimming area with a view of downtown Austin drew nearly 1 million aquaphiles in 2025, up from the shallows of 2020, when 300,000 or so defied the pandemic to take a dip.
The appeal of natural pools seems to be growing nationwide as outdoor recreationalists increasingly eschew chemicals and additives. And while Barton Springs is probably the best-known natural pool in the country, nontraditional swimming spots in New Jersey, Minnesota, Florida, and Colorado have all reported recent upticks in traffic.
The same is true in Virginia, where the Blue Ridge Swim Club just outside Charlottesville has seen its membership roughly double in the past several years. “For some reason, we’ve grown a great deal,” club owner Todd Barnett says.
According to Barnett, Barton Springs is the “greatest pool in the country.” The Blue Ridge Swim Club will never match Austin’s three-acre bathing behemoth in size and diversity. But after a few recent improvements and the right eddy of the zeitgeist, the club’s local esteem has blossomed.
C’ville’s own
Somewhere in the Blue Ridge foothills just west of Crozet, water is collecting. As part of the Chesapeake Bay watershed, it will filter down into the James, Mechums, and Moormans rivers, among many other streams and tributaries.
Near Taylors Gap, rivulets will form together and become Ivy Creek, much of the volume destined to dump into the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir north of Charlottesville. Other Ivy Creek water columns will meander north and east and drift off into a variety of smaller waterways.
Just northeast of where Owensville Road meets U.S. 250, a select group of the happy little H2O molecules will find themselves easing down an unnamed branch of Ivy Creek. They’ve been selected to settle into the roughly 100-yard concrete pool that is the focal point of the Blue Ridge Swim Club. There, the liquid will rest under countless shade trees, cooling loyal local swimmers to a chilly 70 degrees even on hot summer days.
Then, unceremoniously, the molecules will be shuttled out, replaced by other waters flowing down from the Blue Ridge and making a detour on their way to the Chesapeake Bay.
The stream-fed Blue Ridge Swim Club is unlike any other pool in the area. Bright blue, highly chlorinated waters are eschewed for green-hued flows. The only thing separating the appearance of the water from that of a lake, pond, or other natural swimming hole is concerted water replenishment, light chlorination, and a filter guarding against wildlife and plant matter.
“It doesn’t look like backyard pool water … but there’s something going on where people are embracing this place,” Barnett says. “I think that, in our lives and in our children’s lives, things are increasingly sterile and indoors and digital. This pool is maybe old school or something like that. People have really reacted to it in a positive way.”
Camped out
Barnett purchased the Blue Ridge Swim Club in 2011, not because he wanted to run a pool, but because he saw the rustic grounds’ potential for a summer camp. He had operated his Blue Ridge Field Camp out of a Free Union location along the Moormans River since 2000, and the Ivy swim club’s pool and surrounding areas were a perfect fit for the camp’s mission to give young people “friendships, adventure, and wonderful memories of summer.”
Barnett’s idea wasn’t completely original. From 1913 to 1919, the swim club served as the centerpiece of Blue Ridge Camp, founded by the pool’s designer, R. Warner Wood. According to historical accounts, the University of Virginia graduate’s camp offered “symmetrical, physical, moral, and social development in boys, along with plenty of healthful, natural fun.”
The natural pool went through two other owners up to 1966, when a group of club members rescued the property from potential shuttering as the suburbs closed in around it. The members ran the club not as a profit center, but as a beloved location where they could enjoy the outdoors and bracing runoff of the Blue Ridge.
Barnett has come to love the pool in his own way over the years—if somewhat begrudgingly. Like the passionate owners before him, he didn’t make money on the pool in its early years. That’s changed as he’s grown membership and made upgrades. In addition to adding the filter about five years ago—an improvement that’s made the waters more translucent and reduced in-pool debris—he built a timber-frame pavilion on the grounds, put in new decking and seating, and had the property placed on the National Register of Historic Places.
“He’s just done amazing things,” longtime club member Mandy Peacock says. “It’s not overdone; you’re not getting tons of communication or slick social media. But he loves the pool, and it comes across.”
The pool retains its natural algae despite the new filter and light chlorination. The flora growth is managed further by the pool’s year-round cold temperatures. Regardless of the forecast, the water never eclipses the high 70s, while many public pools warm into the low 90s at summer’s peak.
The algae-limiting cold water is a fair trade off for most members. “It always feels at least 10 degrees cooler than any other local pool,” says Georgia Lindsey, whose family joined the swim club two years ago. “That’s part of the allure for my husband. He knows he can duck in there and cool off after a hot car ride home from work. It’s sometimes too cold for me, but everyone else really enjoys it.”
Family time
Peacock has been a Blue Ridge Swim Club member for well over a decade. After moving back to Charlottesville, she read about the gem in one of the local papers. She was living downtown at the time, but she thought it would be worth the drive. She’s never second-guessed the decision.
“It’s my favorite place in the world,” Peacock says. “It’s like a magical oasis in the woods.”
Several years after Peacock joined the club herself, she and her husband had their first child. She says, only half jokingly, that the couple decided to have kids just so the little ones could go to Field Camp. She’s old-fashioned, she says, a luddite, and Field Camp appealed to the part of her that wished she could have attended a trapped-in-time summer camp in her own youth.
Peacock says she and her husband go to the Blue Ridge pool about once a week after work and again on weekends with the kids. The wife and husband run Peacock Auto Service, and they often see their customers, friends, and neighbors dotted across the grounds.
On a recent Saturday at the pool, Peacock looked around and noticed not a single person staring at his or her phone. People sat in circles, idly chatting, or alone, quietly reading. “There’s of course no rule against phones. It’s just self-imposed,” she says. “People don’t feel like pulling them out.”
Lindsey went the opposite direction in deciding to join the Blue Ridge family—her kids had attended Field Camp for about 10 years before she and her husband became club members two years ago. On a typical Sunday, the Lindseys pack a cooler bag with snacks and drinks, bundle up their towels, and find a good spot around the pool. Lindsey might sit and read while the others enjoy the diving board.
“We’re definitely not trying to be quiet necessarily, but there is a feeling of peacefulness,” Lindsey says. “There are a lot of people that don’t have kids there, and we’re cognizant of that.”
Finding comfort
Barnett recognizes Blue Ridge Swim Club isn’t for everyone, and that’s a good thing. For the first time since he purchased the club, he had to impose a strict cap on member numbers this year. He doesn’t quiz prospective members about the number of people in their family or place limits on guests, so he’s never quite sure how many folks will show up on a busy weekend day.
For some guests encountering the pool for the first time, taking the plunge takes courage. “There’s always a sense of, ‘what could be on the bottom of this pool,’ that I don’t think ever goes away,” Lindsey says. “But it’s more fun than scary.”
Lindsey and her husband grew up around swimming holes and rivers, and she appreciates that her kids have grown accustomed to “a different type of pool.” For Field Camp attendees, not swimming in the pool would likely be grounds for a wedgie.
Peacock, likewise, says the Blue Ridge pool’s mystery is part of the charm—on top of all the usual “hidden-gem-throwback–to-an-easier-time” praise those in the know offer up. And in the end, Blue Ridge members, as well as Barnett himself, wouldn’t mind if their gem stayed hidden. Growth would require more parking, more employees (already difficult because of the business’ seasonality), and more paper-pushing.
Blue Ridge will never draw a million guests in a year like Barton Springs. But as long as the clean, clear water flows from the western hills into Ivy Creek and through the gates of Barnett’s swim club, he’ll keep up his labor of like.
“When I bought the place, I continued to run the swim club in part because my wife told me I didn’t want to be the person who closes it,” he says. “It’s a very different sort of swimming experience, but somehow the word has gotten out among particular people. We’ll keep taking baby steps. No one likes the idea of big crowds out here.”
Dive in
There’s no shortage of places to get your dip on in and around Charlottesville—be they traditional man-made pools or natural swimming holes.
Pools
Booker T. Washington Park Pool Outdoor lap pool, zero-depth area, slides. Open 11am to 7pm daily through August 11 and weekends through September 7.
Brooks Family YMCA Indoor lap pool, zero-depth area, diving board, inflatable water track. Open to members Monday to Friday 5:30am to 8:30pm, Saturday 7am to 5:30pm, and Sunday noon to 5:30pm.
Fry’s Spring Beach Club Outdoor members-only club, three swimming pools, recreation areas. Open to members daily through September 7 and September 12–13. Hours vary; typically 10am to 8:30pm.
Hollymead Swim Club Outdoor members-only lap pool, diving well, baby pool. Open daily through August 11 and Thursday to Sunday through September 13. Hours vary; typically 11:30am to 8pm through August 11 and 4pm to 8pm through September 13. Open Labor Day 11:30am to 8pm.
North Grounds Recreation Center Indoor lap pool at UVA, family swim hours. Open Monday to Friday 5:30am to 9pm and Saturday/Sunday 8am to 9pm.
Old Trail Swim Club Outdoor members-only lap pool, zero-depth area, diving board. Open Monday to Sunday 10am to 8pm through August 11; Monday to Friday 4:30pm to 8pm and weekends 10am to 8pm through September 13; and 10am to 8pm Labor Day.
Onesty Family Aquatic Center Outdoor lap pool, water slides, in-water playgrounds, lazy river, diving board, zero-depth area, inflatable water track. Open 11am to 7pm daily through August 11 and weekends through September 7.
Smith Aquatic & Fitness Center Indoor lap pool, zero-depth area, lazy river, slides. Open Monday to Thursday 7am to 7:45pm, Friday and Saturday 7am to 6:45pm, and Sunday 10am to 5:45pm.
All natural
Blue Hole on Moormans River Swimming hole, 1.5-mile hike from Sugar Hollow parking area. Open daily until dark (seasonal).
Chris Greene Lake Park County beach, swimming, boating, fishing area. Open daily 7am to dark (seasonal).
Mint Springs Valley Park County beach, swimming, boating, fishing area. Open daily 7am to dark (seasonal).
Rip Rap Hollow Trail Swimming hole, 3.5-mile strenuous hike from parking area. Open daily until dark (seasonal).
Sherando Lake Spring-fed lake, beach, swimming, recreational areas. Open daily until dark (seasonal).
Snake Hole on Moormans River Swimming hole, 0.8-mile hike from Sugar Hollow parking area. Open daily until dark (seasonal).
St. Mary’s River Falls, swimming area, 2-mile hike from parking area. Open daily until dark (seasonal).
Walnut Creek Park County beach, swimming, boating, fishing area. Open daily from 7am to dark (seasonal).
