Taylor 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.
A few miles outside Victor in Teton County, eastern Idaho, Taylor Springs is a named spring with very little heat in it. The single reading on file, from November 1958, makes the water about as cool as anything still called warm. Land ownership goes unrecorded, and so does public access. The test turned up sodium, sulfate, chloride, calcium and magnesium, with the water close to neutral.
South 4500 West passes within a hundred yards, so the approach is a pull-off and a few steps. The valley sits high, right around six thousand feet, and catches a heavy winter, with snow piling to ten feet in an average year and a moderately wet climate overall. Land ownership is a blank in the record.
Winter, December through February, is what gets recommended, and in this valley that means deep snow. Pine Creek Campground is two and a half miles off if you want a base. The water runs far too cool to burn anybody. No access is recorded, so check before you go, and bear in mind the temperature comes from a survey pushing seventy years old.
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 Taylor Springs.
- Setting
- Gentle slope
- The ground tilts gently up to the west.
- Highest ground nearby
- 246 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 31% 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 Taylor Springs is slightly alkaline (pH 7.7).
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The Pine Creek Campground has 10 single units and restroomsNo Host; No Services; Dispersed Camping allowed in off season
Taylor Springs sits at 6,092 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 24% stronger than at sea level, so bring sunscreen and drink more water than you normally would.
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Taylor Springs is road-accessible, so you can bring more gear. Cold air temperatures make a changing robe or warm layers essential.
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