Day 4: Liard River Hot Springs – 0 Miles Traveled (May 1, 2016)

As we drink our morning coffee, we watch a female Wood Bison and her calf wander through our site. Wow – I’m so surprised that I forget all about my camera!

We can’t wait to go soak in the hot springs but first, we have to walk across the street to the commercial campground to get change so we can pay for another night at Liard River Hot Springs. They have a small convenience store but there isn’t much to buy. I finally end up buying a large jar of very expensive (CN$9.99) peanut butter. A herd of Wood Bison is hanging out by the side of the road next to the convenience store parking lot.

We can’t wait to go soak in the hot springs but first, we have to walk across the street to the commercial campground to get change so we can pay for another night at Liard River Hot Springs. They have a small convenience store but there isn’t much to buy. I finally end up buying a large jar of very expensive (CN$9.99) peanut butter. A herd of Wood Bison is hanging out by the side of the road next to the convenience store parking lot.

Mike and I walk back to the RV through the woods to drop off my camera & the peanut butter, and then we walk up to the front entrance kiosk to pay for another night of camping. We discover that prices for camping increased on May 1 from CN$16.00 to CN$26.00! We put CN$16.00 in the envelope and hope for the best – we haven’t seen any sign of park rangers or employees since we got here.

At 11:30 we’re finally able to walk over to the boardwalk and to the hot springs for our soak. Bird watching is excellent as we walk on the boardwalk that takes us through the wetland to the hot springs. We see fat American Robins, Canada Geese, Rusty Blackbirds, Pine Siskins, White-Browed Sparrows, and Greater & Lesser Yellowlegs.

We check out the hot springs, two pools with stairs and handrails to make it easy to get in and out, and changing rooms/toilets. There’s a strong smell of sulfur. There are about twenty people soaking in the hot springs, so it certainly isn’t very crowded.

We go in the lower pool first, since it’s cooler. It’s so pleasant to float around the natural pool, drifting through warm & cool (but never cold) areas. Once we’re acclimated, we go in the hotter upper pool. It’s a little too hot for Mike but it’s perfect for me. The closer one gets to the end of this pool (where the hot water flows in), the hotter it gets. I venture close to the end but it gets too hot even for me. We spent at least an hour soaking in this pool, getting out occasionally to sit on a bench & cool off and then going back in.

At about 1:00 pm the mosquitos start to bother us and we’re hungry so we decide to go back to the RV. Walking back from the hot springs along the boardwalk, we see a couple of Lesser Yellowlegs in the wetland. After lunch, we walk back to the hot springs for another soak. This time we see a moose grazing in a pond just off the boardwalk.

We soak for another hour and a half, chatting with interesting people who are soaking too. We talk to a man who rebuilds old boats in Victoria, lives in the Yukon, and is driving back from Cabo San Lucas. Another couple is driving to their summer home in Alaska, Kasilof River Lodge, on the Kenai Peninsula near Homer. During the winter they live and work in Sebastopol! We talk to a young Israeli guy who is hitchhiking across Canada after spending six months in India. And another couple is from Maine; they just retired and are taking their first big trip in their RV together, driving across Canada starting in Montreal and ending up in Alaska (and after spending some time in Alaska, they’ll drive back to Maine across Canada via a different route). And we talk to a young man who is traveling to his job as a waiter at the Princess/Norwegian Cruises McKinley Lodge.

After our soak, we walk on the boardwalk and then stairs up to the Hanging Gardens, an area where lufa has built up from the warm water trickling through and lots of green plants are able to grow because of the heat.

As evening falls, the view from the Hanging Gardens of the forest and surrounding mountains in the Provincial Park is magnificent.

The moose is gone when we walk back to the RV after our soak but frogs are making a racket in the pond by the parking lot and we see more American Robins, Rusty Blackbirds, White-Browed Sparrows, and Canada Geese. We notice the car with Yukon plates that the man is driving from Cabo San Lucas; he’s towing one of those tiny teardrop trailers.

The campground that was so full when we arrived is now practically deserted – just the way we like it!