Glacial valley below looking toward Nevada and Markleeville.
It was an odd request for a teenager. For my son’s 16th birthday he wanted to go to Grover Hot Springs outside of Markleeville in the Eastern Sierras. We’ve never been to a mineral hot spring so we knew we would have a new experience. While the warm pool was nice, the hike was even better.
Arrive early at Grover Hot Springs
We arrived about 11:30 am and debated whether we should hike or hop in the hot pool first. The attendant said they usually reach a maximum of 50 people in the hot springs pools during holidays and then people have to wait until someone leaves. We took our warm bath first.
Just hot spring water
Grover Hot Springs doesn’t have the heavy sulfur smell of other volcanic springs I have been to. Actually, they don’t have a smell at all and very few minerals. The one pool that has the direct hot springs water, maintained between 102o and 104o F, has a brownish green tinge because of the bromide they use to disinfect the water. The water is clear but the pool plaster is what has been stained. The second pool, which is much cooler for swimming, is clear and kept at about 80o F.
Multicultural pool party
It was a relative warm spring day so there was very little steam coming off the pool which is at 6,000′ elevation. Everyone just kind of lounges in the mineral pool and we heard Russian, Japanese and Spanish being spoken by the other bathers. I don’t know if the very low mineral content of the hot springs water has any medicinal properties or not. Some folks spend hours in the pool but we were cooked after about an hour.
First, easiest, waterfall hike
Crashing water between granite boulders.
Next was a hike up to see the Hot Springs Creek waterfall. This is a fairly easy hike and you only have to navigate around some granite boulders near the end to see some magnificent water falling. We could see waterfall after waterfall and got the urge to see how far up we could hike. My son had done the research and told me the whole valley was formed by a glacier. The nice bowl shape of the valley would seem to indicate that.
Blaze a trail
There really is no trail up the north side of the creek, but the terrain isn’t all that difficult. Burnside Lake trail, which we didn’t take, winds up the side of the mountain to take you to the top where Hot Spring Creek originates. We’ll do that on another hike. Except for one area that is a debris field of scattered tree trunks washed down from a previous flooding event, you just have to meander around low brush and hop across rocks. I found one tick crawling up my son’s leg on the descent, so do a tick check when you are done.
Stopped by granite wall
We never strayed to far from the creek as we could always hear the crashing water on the rocks. We finally reached an impassable
Our hike ended at shear granite cliff in the glacial valley.
granite wall and were forced to trek over to the creek. As we climbed on top of the granite boulders, we could hear the water flowing underneath. From aerial views, it is apparent that during large storms or heavy snow melt the water cascades over these granite boulders left by the glacier.
Sky and valley views
The mile we hiked from the first waterfall location at the base up to where we stopped had a 1,000′ elevation gain. This provided spectacular views of the valley below. Because the creek is rimmed by granite cliffs above where we were, I wouldn’t want to climb much higher as there is no escape route. Our short but strenuous hike was more of a spectacular adventure than I had expected. But the Carson range and the eastern Sierras ever cease to amaze me with their beauty that rivals Yosemite.
Click to enlarge thumnails. All videos and photos were taken with my iPhone and several photos enhanced with Instagram.
