Fish Springs
Fish Springs is a warm seep right on the edge of Desert Shores in Imperial County, a third mile from town and well below sea level. The water is at the threshold of soaking warmth. Owner and access are both missing from the record, which matters this close to town.
Roadside, two hundred-odd feet from pavement or dirt, the record is mute on which, and the road has no name on file. Low desert floor, well below sea level. Rain amounts to around four inches in a year. Snow, none. Average temperatures in the high seventies.
Cool months only; the record points to December through February, and the yearly average suggests summers are brutal. Check ownership before you go near it. You can reach it from the car. No campground is listed, and nothing on file mentions a fee. The water is warm, at the line where a soak starts to feel like one.
Aircraft with laser scanners measured this ground to within inches. The scan strips out trees and buildings, leaving the bare shape of the land around Fish Springs.
Drag the handle to compare the two views. The orange dot marks the spring, in a frame about three quarters of a mile wide.
- Setting
- Open ground
- Flat, open ground all around.
- Highest ground nearby
- 23 ft above the spring
- Within a quarter mile, to the west
A slice through the ground from west to east, about 0.6 miles end to end.
Elevation data: USGS 3D Elevation Program. Aerial imagery: USGS The National Map. Public domain.
That's about 1½ times the US average of 65. It's higher than at 35% of the springs on this site.
Heat flow measures the warmth working its way up through the ground from deep inside the earth. Where it runs high, rain and snowmelt that seep down through cracks in the rock come back up hot.
See every spring on the geothermal heat map →
Heat flow estimate: Stanford Thermal Earth Model (Aljubran & Horne, 2024), CC BY 4.0.
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Fish Springs is road-accessible, so you can bring more gear. Bring sun protection for exposed soaking.
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