Unnamed Thermal Spring
Thirty-some miles from Winnemucca in Humboldt County, this is an unnamed hot spring with a recorded temperature well above what skin tolerates for long, hot enough to need cooling before any soak. Who owns the land is not on file, and neither is the access status. That combination means you cannot assume you are allowed there. The hike in from the nearest highway is over a mile.
The I.O.N. Highway is the closest road on record and the spring is about a mile and a third from it, classed as a hike. The record does not name a land manager or a unit. Elevation is high desert, a little under 4,500 feet. Dry country, with a modest amount of winter snow.
The favored season here is winter. Nobody knows who owns it, so look that up before you drive out. A spring with no recorded access status can easily turn out to be on private ground. Prolonged contact with water this hot will burn, so test it before you step in. No campground is listed, and nobody has sampled the chemistry.
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 this 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.
- Setting
- Gentle slope
- The ground tilts gently up to the northeast.
- Highest ground nearby
- 243 ft above the spring
- Within a quarter mile, to the northeast
A slice through the ground from southwest to northeast, 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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this spring is road-accessible, so you can bring more gear. The water runs hot, so extra hydration is key.
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