Liard Hot Springs
02 July 2018
Meet Fred and Bob!
Not long after I left Fort Nelson this morning, the landscape changed. The hills got closer together, more rugged, and steeper. Accordingly, the road got curvier and therefore more fun. Even better, the weather was warm and perfect. So, I don’t have a ton of pictures for this section because I was having too much fun riding. But I did stop at a couple places and take a few.
About the time I reached Muncho Lake, I realized two things. First, I was hungry, the Tim Hortons egg and bacon breakfast english muffin only goes so far and we were approaching 2pm. Second, I was getting sick. My throat was sore, my left ear kinda hurt, but that was about it. I stopped in at the lodge on the side of the lake and had an excellent cup of coffee and about a quarter of a delicious homemade cinnamon roll (I didn’t expect a cinnamon roll the size of a small dog, but there it was). After getting the remainder of my roll wrapped up in plastic and stuffing it into my top case, I carried on. At this point, the road sticks along the side of Muncho Lake, which was apparently one of the most expensive and labor intensive parts of building the Alaska Highway since they were having to move so much material out of the way to get the road right next to the lake. The result is spectactular though, just don’t miss a curve unless you need a bath.
I rolled on and the road opened up a little, with a few more trees, but still relatively curvy compared to previous days. The next thing that really grabbed my attention was this mountain which loomed in front of me. It looks like it had quite a history with the way the layers of the rock are all folded up. I’d love to come back here with someone that knows the local geology, I bet it would be really interesting.
As usual, you can’t go down a road in the middle of nowhere without a few tourists stopped on the side of the road. These stopped for some buffalo that were occupying the road.
Eventually I arrived at Liaird Hot Springs. There is a park there with a very nice campground and some very old hot springs. I first found out about it by talking to people I met on the trail in Banff, but in subsequent conversations I found out that its very popular and if you get there too late, you end up in “Overflow camping,” a gravel parking lot across the road from the campground. I got there about 3pm and fully expected to be in overflow. Surprisingly enough, they had about 3 sites left and one of them was all mine. I chose the one nearest the food lockers, got all set up, and then fully intended to go take a dip in the springs.
As I was walking away from my site, towel in hand, I met Fred, he was dining behind this camper.
A small crowd gathered (there’s video on my flickr), and we watched as Fred the Buffalo methodically went back and forth behind the camper, just like a lawnmower, eating the grass. Then he ran out of fresh grass, and wandered over to my site.
As long as you keep your distance, he couldn’t care less. I stood and watched for a while, then he moved on to the next site, and I moved on to the hot springs.
One of the really neat things about these hot springs is that they were here when the glaciers were here. The entire area around this park was glaciated, but the springs created their own little warm environment, resulting in a warm swamp with a huge variety of plant and animal life that isn’t found elsewhere in the area. Its kind of like a geothermal rainforest.
The springs has been developed nicely with a full set of changing rooms, stainless hand railings, and even a little waterfall. The pools are at the confluence of the output from the springs which flow into a large pool. That pool empties into another pool that is also fed by a cold stream. The result is a couple of pools where you can find just about any temperature you like. Near to the place where the hot spring water flows into the pool, my watch measured 47C, or 116.6F. Toasty!
Aside from being in a natural hot tub, the other fun part is the people you meet here. I ran into some Swiss, some Canadians, some Germans, some Americans and a few Native Americans. And, everybody’s pretty happy and willing to chat.
I wanted to get more pictures, but my late waterproof camera turned out to be less waterproof after I replaced its screen (after crushing it in Spider Cave at Carlsbad…). It had a rough life, may it rest in peace.
Back at camp, I was just settling down with a bowl of noodles and pesto when I hear the unmistakable sound of a BMW boxer rolling through the campsite. Moments later, Bob was parked in my campsite. He had just ridden in from Whitehorse and really needed a campsite, but would be banished to the Overflow if he went with normal means. One of the strategies in that situation is to go into a campground, tell the people at the gate that your friend you just met is in it, find another motorcyclist, ask to split their site, and then go clear it with management. And thats exactly what he did. I had plenty of room and didn’t mind saving $10, so Bob and I split the campsite for the night. He’s a retired pilot from New York, rides this R1200GS and all in all is a good guy. We chatted about everything from motorcycles to disability insurance, he showed me all of fancy features of his bike (Turns out it has a mouse on the handlebars for operating the GPS. And I was excited about the voltmeter I velcroed to my gauges…), and even let me sit on it! It was like climbing onto a horse, probably because it was up on the centerstand. But once on, it was really comfy.
After Bob got settled, I showed him how to get to the hot springs and spent the rest of the evening kicking back in the warm sulphury water.
Pro Tip: Sit under the waterfall, it’s a great shoulder massage.
