Endless Simmer

The oohs and many aahs that come with a hot-spring-hopping road trip through the Idaho wilderness

- Matt Gross

We’d driven three hours already, down icy, foggy roads that snaked along frothing rivers and through mountains covered in snowy conifers. And now, as we finally emerged into a high desert of sandstone buffs and wide-open skies in Elk B nd, Idaho, it seemed we might go no farther.

Before us, a narrow trail that switchbacked up the north-facing hill was covered in 3 inches of snow concealing a layer of thick, slick ice. Three companions had joined me: Joyce Lee, a heavily laden photographer; Tristan Pettigrew, her less-burdened assistant; and Erin Gray, an old Idaho friend I hadn’t seen in years. We came armed with headlamps and hiking boots, poles and fleece, supermarket sandwiches and a thermos of hot coffee. But what we needed were crampons, something, anything, to help our feet dig in. Because who knew how long it would go on? We had at least 2 miles of trail to hike and 1,400 feet to climb; slipping and sliding the whole way didn’t seem smart.

Smart or not, we’d do it anyway, because in them thar hills, we knew, lay gold—Goldbug Hot Springs, that is. “One of those too good to be true occurrences in nature,” according to the Complete Guide to Idaho Hot Springs. Idaho? Hot springs? Yes! Idaho has 130 soakable hot springs, more than any other state, thanks in large part to the Idaho Batholith, 15,400 square miles of mountains created over millions of years by colliding tectonic plates.

Rather than being heated directly by active magma, as in Yellowstone National Park, the hot water here results from plate friction. Dozens and dozens of springs lie just off highways, down trails short or long, nestled in canyons, or built into hotel features.