The Big Soak: Seeking Nirvana in Idaho’s Backcountry

We were hiking along a wooded trail in the Boise National Forest in central Idaho, mesmerized by the whitewater rush of the river beside us, when we spotted the wafts of steam rising from the natural hot springs just ahead.

I could already feel the toasty warmth of those therapeutic waters as I paused on the hilltop. Just below lay a succession of knee-deep geothermic pools known as the Bonneville hot springs that beckoned like a soothing oasis in the heart of the forest.

At dozen people had beaten us there. But they didn’t seem relaxed. They were rattled.

“Watch out!” a woman called out. “Be careful! Look out behind you!”

I froze, thinking that I had somehow blundered into danger.

Then I saw it hulking at the river’s edge: a humongous sawed-off tree trunk the size of a double-wide refrigerator that just moments earlier had come bounding down from the wooded mountainside above, bouncing like a dervish, sending children sprawling, mothers screaming in shock, before coming to rest at the river’s edge. 

Just upstream, two larger slabs of truncated trees brooded in silence. This wasn’t a one-off occurrence. This place was a war zone. Tree parts were dropping from the skies. “That thing almost killed us,” the woman gasped. “It came out of nowhere.”

Within minutes, the parents had packed their belongings and were dragging their children back up the twisting trail, spooked by their brush with disaster, leaving my wife and I alone at the scene.

Guidebooks warn that hundreds of enthusiasts a day flocked here each summer. 

But now we had the place to ourselves, ready to sit back, relax and have a good long solitary soak.

*

Known as a “hot springs mecca,” Idaho offers some 130 soakable sites across its rural reaches. The region’s higher-than-average geothermal gradient means the Earth’s temperature heats up more quickly with depth than in other places. Groundwater that sinks beneath the surface later rises as nature’s answer to a steamy hot bath.

These savored spots have names like Goldbug, Boat Box, Frenchman’s Bend, Lava, Mundo and Sunbeam. Some can be found just off the highway or after a short walk in the woods. Others are more secluded and require longer hikes or hair-raising descents down steep inclines. All of them are free to use. Some places charge for parking.

There are also for-profit business that pipe natural spring water into public and private wading pools and charge for admittance and add-ons such as towels and lockers.

Hot springs enthusiasts practice one of the world’s oldest pleasures. Known as balneotherapy, lingering soaks in heated mineral-rich water provide such physical and psychological benefits as improved circulation, pain relief and stress reduction.

Yet danger lurks out here in the wilds of Idaho. 

Many hot springs feeder spouts are dangerously hot. Users have been burned and even killed. In 2015 two dogs died when they jumped into a 180-degree pool and a hiker who dove in to save them suffered sever burns. A 74-year-old man perished from a heart attack and a couple in their 80s drowned in a private soak room.

But I didn’t worry about any of that: I have my own personal strategy for sizing up the temperature of any hot springs, public pool, private bathtub or personal relationship:

I call it the Big Toe Technique.

*

We began our impromptu soaking tour at Kirkham hot springs, rolling up in a rented bright-red Cadillac SUV that my politically-conservative wife irksomely called the MAGA-mobile. But in a state known for its underground survivalist cells, which voted overwhelmingly for Trump in 2024, I considered that car my undercover decoy.

The site, located along the Payatte River in the Boise National Forest, is known for its cascading waterfalls, natural pools and breathtaking views. To arrive here we’d passed though swaths of forest that had been scorched by wildfires, leaving behind the blackened skeletons of trees that looked like eerie armies of matchstick men.

Easing down a narrow path, we paused to absorb the beauty of the steaming pools set into a rocky hillside, the companion river running through the whole breathtaking scene. Then I realized the trip’s first blunder:

For space reasons, I’d left behind the rubber sandals to protect my feet from saber-toothed rocks and stones.

I had one pair of slip-on shoes I could not afford to get wet, so I inched along barefoot, wincing with each tentative step. My wife, better prepared with proper foot wear, brushed past me and was soon lolling and splashing in the hot pools like she was a kid again, a toddler taking a Saturday night bath.

I was on my own. Not only did the rocks stab, they were slippery. After two recent hip replacements, I tottered unsteadily like the Tin Man, something mechanical and unwieldy. At one point, both feet gave way and I almost tumbled into the cold river waters nearby.

An hour later, I eased up the trail to encounter a man my age I’d previously spotted in the parking lot. He sat on the edge of a rock as his wife frolicked in the pools below.

“Don’t get old,” I said in solidarity.

He considered the scene.

“Twenty-five years ago, I would have tried it,” he said, adding, “I saw you almost fall down there. That’s why I don’t go.”

I blushed. He’d witnessed my stumble. My Big Toe Technique was failing big time.

*

Over four days, we visited a half-dozen hot springs, most of them wild and mostly untouched. Like the place called Sunbeam, located a few steps off the road nearly the high-plains town of Stanley. As we relaxed in ankle-deep waters at sunset, we felt like pampered Pharaohs.

But not all our reconnaissance was accurate. We learned that a long-anticipated riverside stop featuring hot spring water pumped into two large metal buckets had closed after the tubs were washed away in a spring flood.  

A bartender in the town of Riggins told us that a high-end spa there had closed. When I said I’d just read about its online, she snapped: “Go ahead. But before you can get into those waters, you gotta pay the $7.8 million to buy the place.”  

Still, each successful soak made me glad I’d come. I slept soundly at night. Near the town of McCall, we encountered a family-run spa called Zimms that was more like a poor-man’s spa, with outdoor soaking pools and indoor pool tables. 

But something wasn’t right. Before we paid, we looked out to see the pools overrun by kids of all ages — shrieking, splashing, running. It was like a junior high school recess. All that was missing were the monkey bars.

We fled back to the SUV and tried our luck at another family-run spa. To reach the Gold Fork hot springs, we bumped along for six miles on a dust-choked dirt road, at one point passing a small “closed” sign next to an open gate. A long line of cars passed in the other direction. We high-fived, thinking that we’d avoided the rush.

At the front desk, a greying woman with bad teeth wasn’t happy to see us. “Didn’t you see the closed sign down the road?” she squawked. “We’re overrun. We had 400 people in here just a few hours ago. We’re closing to clean the place.”

But she eventually relented and we paid our $10 entrance fee. Within minutes we were luxuriating in a large rectangular pool with an imported rock wall to create the illusion that this wasn’t just another backwoods hot springs tourist trap. 

As the crowds diminished, I looked more closely at the water. Horrified, I spotted floating flakes of skin and hair and wiggly microscopic protozoa left behind by the hoards of hot-springs denizens on that Saturday afternoon.

Back at the hotel, we took long hot showers and still didn’t feel clean. 

Still, I slept like I’d been drugged.

*

At Bonneville, where soakers had barely dodged that bounding hunk of tree trunk, I finally noticed a single, solitary man basking next to the river, nearly lost in the surrounding steam. Unlike the others, he was a poster boy for natural relaxation.

Bill told me he’d driven 100 miles from Boise for a some quiet time. As we talked, I inched my way over several small rocks and suddenly lost my balance, almost comically waving my hands in the air to keep myself upright.

I slammed down onto a large boulder, thudding like a crash test dummy, praying that my new left hip would hold up. It did, if barely.

“Wow, man,” Bill said, looking alarmed. “Be careful there.”

Again, I evoked a blush of embarrassment that had nothing to do with therapeutic hot waters. I’ve since retired my Big Toe Technique and now follow a new hot springs rule-of-thumb:

Bring your effin’ sandals.