Geology of the National Parks Through Pictures - Hot Springs

My next post about the Geology of the National Parks Through Pictures is an old park visit, but one I never actually published as part of this series. I visited this park back in 2003, before I was focused on the geology of the parks. 

You can find more Geology of the National Parks Through Pictures as well as my Geological State Symbols Across America series at my website Dinojim.com.

This post relates to the Arkansas Geological State Symbols post that came out earlier this week.

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Hot Springs National Park

The water within Hot Springs National Park is unique in that it has traveled a very long way down into the ground surface. These waters have been heated up by geothermal activity (the heat inside the Earth) as opposed to the volcanic activity that you would see at springs in areas like Yellowstone. Here is Bathhouse Row, where the bathhouses are lined up along the areas where the natural springs come to the surface.

 Since the water has been heated by geothermal activity, none of the nasty chemicals associated with volcanic hot springs are present in these waters. That makes it so these waters are able to not only be bathed in, such as at the bathhouse,

 but also you can drink the water, such as at one of the free hot spring fountains.

Although, many of the bathhouses obscure the natural emergence points of the hot springs, some of the natural springs can still be seen along the area, such as this spring adjacent to Bathhouse Row.