Thanks To Jimmy Buffett, Your Next Vacation Destination May Be On Lake Conroe

Texas is getting its first Margaritaville resort. 

Margaritaville Holdings, Songy Highroads and The Wampold Cos. announced plans to redevelop the La Torretta Lake Resort & Spa into a new 360-room resort on Lake Conroe, about one hour north of Houston and a few hours from Austin, Dallas and San Antonio. The Jimmy Buffett-branded resort is scheduled to open in Q3 2020.   

“This resort will be a welcome escape for those in Texas’s major metropolitan areas and beyond, offering a lakeside paradise dedicated to relaxation, fun, adventure and the Margaritaville state of mind,” Margaritaville Senior Vice President Rick Cunningham said in a release.

Situated on 186 acres of waterfront property, Margaritaville will feature newly renovated amenities such as waterfront villas, dining concepts, an 18-hole golf course, tennis facilities, a spa, outdoor pools and 45K SF of indoor and outdoor meeting space.

Two of the existing restaurants will be converted into Margaritaville-branded concepts: LandShark Bar & Grill and 5 o’Clock Somewhere Bar & Grill. 

Atlanta-based SHR and Baton Rouge, Louisiana-based Wampold will serve as co-managing partners of the new resort. The duo has partnered on numerous projects over the past decade. SHR owns two properties in Houston, a Hyatt Regency and Hyatt Place near The Galleria shopping center. Benchmark Global Hospitality will serve as resort manager. 

The revitalization efforts will provide a much-needed full-service, high-end resort to Lake Conroe, according to Houston-based hotel consulting firm DPC Hospitality. 

“The Margaritaville brand has the potential to transform the existing property in a highly desirable way for Conroe,” Senior Vice President Christian Abbate wrote in an email. “As a leisure-driven brand, it is likely the Margaritaville Resort will attract greater demand from other areas of Texas on top of what it will attract from Houston.”