Hot Springs

Hot Springs is unlike any other national park in the system: its most famous feature, Bathhouse Row, sits directly on a city street in downtown Hot Springs, Arkansas, with the park's forested mountains rising immediately behind it. The thermal water itself fell as rain more than 4,000 years ago, slowly percolating through Ouachita Mountain rock and rising back to the surface hot enough to soak in, without any of the volcanic activity that powers hot springs elsewhere.

Federally protected since 1832, decades before Yellowstone became the first national park, this was the first piece of land the federal government set aside specifically to preserve a natural resource for public use. Of the historic bathhouses along the row, only two, the Buckstaff and the Quapaw, still operate as working bathhouses today; the rest have become museums, galleries, a brewery, and the park's own visitor center.

Come for the historic architecture and a genuine soak in thermal water. Stay for the fact that 26 miles of hiking trails climb into real forest just steps from downtown. Read the story, trust the live data above for what is open today, and when you leave, collect the stamp.