Bagby Hot Springs quite by accident

We had quite the accidental adventure this weekend. Todd and I headed up the mountain to Mcneil, a quiet campground we enjoy that doesn’t take reservations and is rarely busy. We had nothing planned other than a quiet weekend of relaxation. I had gone on a buying spree on my Kindle and figured I’d enjoy a new book, good food, and some sunshine.

One of our favorite spots at McNeil

A nice breakfast and we were on our way…

Saturday arrived and we enjoyed a quiet breakfast and then decided to drive around the mountain a bit to scope out some campgrounds that we might want to visit later this summer. We tend to get into ruts and revisit the same campgrounds again and again. I kind of hoped to change it up a bit this summer – spice up the blog a bit –  so off we went.

Our first stop was Frog Lake. We were impressed with what we saw…a small lake and a quiet campground (although it was early in the season, we would soon find out!) We made plans to return.

Frog Lake….on our list to visit this summer!

After a stop at the lake we headed to the Timothy Lake area….very, very popular during the summer camping season. Although there were a lot of nice sites on the lake we could tell already that this probably wouldn’t be a first choice for us. We hadn’t been gone for very long and weren’t ready to head back to camp quite yet, so we thought we’d drive up to Olalie Lake and maybe hike around for a couple of hours. We’d visited the area when the kids were little and had fond memories of it. The problem is that we were in our truck this time sans navigation system and without a map. The road to Olalie is narrow and winding and the signs had all been riddled with bullet holes or vandalized to the  point that you weren’t able to read any directions. We guessed at every fork in the road, and ended up completely on the other side of Mt. Hood in the Clackamas River area nowhere near Ollalie Lake.

No worries…like I said, we had no plans. We used the opportunity to scout out the many, many campgrounds along the Clackamas. Lots of them totally empty but all of them quite beautiful!. Somehow we ended up near the road that led to Bagby Hot Springs. Curious over the stories I’d heard about the area for many years it seemed like the perfect chance to check it out.

Beginning of hike up the historic hot springs.

We passed several beautiful waterfalls on the way up the bath houses.

We didn’t realize it, but his forest backed up to the Opal Creek Wilderness Area…lots of similar scenery!

Lots of old growth trees

You follow the stream most of the way up!

Bagby Hot Springs has quite a rich history. If you’re interested, Google the area. It makes for some fun reading and photo browsing! We weren’t prepared to use the hot springs but we walked around a bit. Here are a few photos of the springs and bath houses:

Entering the bath house area.

This is where the springs bubble out of the ground. The water is quite hot actually and apparently you need to keep refilling the tubs with buckets of cold water.

Here you can see the little wooden trough that moves the water into the tubs.

A view of the structures that house the tubs…some are wooden barrels and some are hollowed out cedar logs.

Arrived back to camp and enjoyed a nice fire.

It was a fun little adventure!

Here’s a link to Bagby’s website if you’re interested 🙂 http://www.bagbyhotsprings.org