July 23, 2004
-
Update: Nope, no pictures. I didn't want to spend my time obsessing over f-stops. But here's the springs' official website, which has some pictures, as well as the email mailing list archive, which has user-submitted photos.
I spent most of Thursday at a lovely hot spring in the Cascade mountains of central Washington state.
Some friends of mine are doing caretaker work there, looking after the place, making sure people play by the rules, and otherwise enjoying themselves. I went with some other friends up there to visit and do some soaking, and we all had a nice low-key time.
The main spring is in a cave. It extends about, say, 25-30 feet back into the side of a mountain. Just large enough to stand upright inside. The opening has been walled off, so it's full of water just above waist deep.
The water is around 110 F, and (I'm told) smells of sulphur and lithium. The water has a relatively high lithium content, so if the warm doesn't mellow you out, the minerals will.
This water spills over the wall into a series of smaller pools artfully built out of local rocks and cement. The whole thing is in a steep gorge, so there's a mountain river crashing down over the rocks nearby, and this river has been diverted a little bit to provide a cold plunge pool for spring-goers.
Covering this whole scene is a layer of moss and ferns, growing under huge evergreens. One tree on the trail leading to the spring is wide enough for about ten people to hug it at the same time. This is the real-deal Pacific northwest mountain ecosystem.
(I was going to write more, but decided to go public with this entry before that happens.)
Comments (8)
What!? No pictures?
That...sounds...so...beautiful. Breathtaking, really. Several summers ago, I went hiking and whitewater rafting in the mountains of Western North Carolina, and this brings me back to that. There's just something so pristine about nature...something man can never come close to competing with...it's just so spectacular! Especially when you get caught up in the daily grind and forget about life's simple pleasures! Nice post!
Ah, you've talked about Goldmyer in the past before, haven't you? I seem to remember someone telling me about it.
Never been there, but it sounds delightful.
Lithium is, according to some folks, youth serum. There is a "fountain of youth" in Ashland, Oregon which the locals have been drinking naturally lithium-enfused water for decades now. Don't know how much is fact or fiction but it'd be wonderful to experience nonetheless.
What a great way to get OUT of the hot, sticky, smelly, sweltering city.
(No, I'm not f*cking hot, why do you ask!?)
I was gonna ask like James, but really I don't need pictures, I can see it.
Damn, can't you just take a picture without all that obsessing? What is point and shoot all about anyway? Thanks for the link.
'Without obsessing' is pretty much not a possibility.
Kum. Ba. Ya.
Happy soaking. Say hi to the woodfreeks.
i'd like to get a caretaking job like that
Comments are closed.