Dagger Creek Hot Spring
Drag the handle to compare the two views. The orange dot marks the spring, in a frame about three quarters of a mile wide.
Dagger Creek runs at the top of soaking range, about a hundred and ten degrees, at the upper edge of what people soak in. The spring is Forest Service water in Valley County, far from town; Cascade is nearly thirty-seven miles. It is open to visit. Boundary Creek Campground sits about a mile off, close enough to walk over from a tent.
It is half a mile's walk from Dagger Falls Road. The spring sits high, near fifty-eight hundred feet, and the winter snow here runs deep, around fourteen and a half feet, so the road season is short. Precipitation is moderate. The land is Boise National Forest. The record says nothing about what the half mile looks like underfoot.
Winter is the listed best season, for what that is worth with the snow. The water is right at the temperature where a long soak gets uncomfortable, so go in slow. The pH is close to 10, strongly alkaline, and it is a June 1980 number. Camp at Boundary Creek.
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 Dagger Creek Hot Spring.
- Setting
- Canyon floor
- Steep ground climbs away on both sides of the spring.
- Highest ground nearby
- 393 ft above the spring
- Within a quarter mile, to the south
A slice through the ground from northwest to southeast, about 0.6 miles end to end.
Elevation data: USGS 3D Elevation Program. Aerial imagery: USGS The National Map. Public domain.
That's about twice the US average of 65. It's higher than at 72% 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.
The water at Dagger Creek Hot Spring is alkaline (pH 9.9).
Overview Boundary Creek Campground is located at the edge of the Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness, adjacent to the boat launch for the Middle Fork of the Salmon River in Idaho. The site generally provides overnight camping for boaters waiting to launch the next day on their permit to float the Middle Fork. Of the 15 campsites, 5 can be reserved during the high-use season (June 15-Aug. 15); the remaining 10 are first-come, first-served. Outside of those dates, all 15 sites are first-...
Dagger Creek Hot Spring sits at 5,740 feet above sea level, way above the mile-high mark. You may not feel the altitude strongly, but hot water still dehydrates you faster at elevation. UV is about 23% stronger than at sea level, so bring sunscreen and drink more water than you normally would.
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