My friend Noah and I are going to find a remote hot spring tomorrow using my GPS. This is something we have been doing together for years and it’s always worth the efforts when you eventually find the spring. Natural hot springs are an incredible gift and every one has its own story.
Noah just told me about a Native American tribe that would soak in certain hot springs and get absorbed into a spiritual existence.
soak.net has the coordinates of every hot spring in the country. A great resource.
Addendum: We found the hot spring, but it was only a trickle and the pool had not been maintained. It is a beautiful spot deep in the Mendocino National Forest. The photo is of a swimming hole right at the spring. Unfortunately, the area is on private property and some asshole has put up lots of signs saying “Spring closed, thank you for Not Trespassing” and “Enter at your own risk” We found a huge junk pile up in the woods above the spring.
October 14, 2007 at 10:53 am |
I don’t know what to say – I’ve had to keep returning to this posting… ummm…. because the Californian scenery is so beautiful! Hope the trip was a good’un
I’m not at all jealous – we’ve got peerless blue skies and tonight the sound of migrating geese ringing through the stars and a grand fire to keep warm by
October 14, 2007 at 9:01 pm |
Looks like Crabtree Hot Springs. There has been a lot of bad feelings over the ‘adverse possession’ that seems to have affected these hot springs. One side of the river is national forest, while the other side is private property. However, the spring source is within the high-water mark of the river . . . therefore public land and not private. Unfortunately, the land-owner would have you believe otherwise.
October 14, 2007 at 9:46 pm |
Thanks for the info Nude Hiker. It is Crabtree and we were a little dissapointed. The flow was very weak and it needed to be dug out. Have you been there? What was it like?
November 4, 2007 at 10:02 pm |
bankupshins is incorrect! Rick really needs to get his facts correct. Both sides of the creek (and the springs) are PRIVATE PROPERTY! Crabtree was not aquired by “adverse possession” but legally purchased by the laws of our Great State. Anyone could have bought it, it just happened to be me.
It is CLOSED TO THE PUBLIC for reasons I do not wish to discuss here.
Anyone who enters is TRESPASSING, which is against the law! STAY OUT!
I would not come to your home and invade it or send others to your home
so please don’t do it to me. I am asking you to remove the picture and all
information on Crabtree Hot Springs from your website.
If you have any questions about the legallity of this property, contact the
Forest Service or the Lake Co. Sheriff’s Department. They both know that I am the owner and it is private property as I have had to contact them on trespass issues in the past!
Thank you, Janice
November 5, 2007 at 6:24 pm |
Janice, It seems I have stumbled into quite the little dispute. As I noted in my post, the hot spring’s flow seems to be very weak and there is no pool for soaking in, so I did not recommend it to others. However, I am interested in what your reasons are for attempting to close it to the public. This is the perfect forum for you to express why you are so adamant about not letting your fellow human beings enjoy this beautiful gift from God. You have a wonderful opportunity to show your generosity to humanity.
November 9, 2007 at 7:24 pm |
[...] Why do we insist on ownership? What is it about humans that makes us crave ownership and right to always think first of “Me” and “Mine”. I would like to connect this post to a past post on I did on a hot spring hunt that ended up on “private property”. Since I wrote about this hot spring and the hunt for it the owner has commented on the blog and was quite belligerent. Here is the conversation. [...]
November 11, 2007 at 10:45 pm |
My, my. Janice, I will not get embroiled into an argument with you on whether you own the hot springs or not. I merely state the consensus of the hot spring community over the situation and the vitriolic anger you show every time someone tries to discuss the issue.
November 14, 2007 at 2:04 pm |
Janice:
I need to speak my mind. All I can say is that before you “bought” the property, Crabtree was a nice hot spring that people respected and was kept clean. I enjoyed many visits there and met cool people every time who also respected a good natural soak. I showed up once after you bought the property and the place had turned into a total mess. Thanks for ruining it for everyone.
March 14, 2009 at 6:34 pm |
I spent my entire childhood growing up going to Crabtree. Then, one time we went there and there were foreboding private property signs. Once at the springs, the new “owners” gave us flak. Really they seemed to be wounded people, bearing lots of hurt and trauma. Nevertheless, they shouldn’t “own” the springs; in fact, they ruined the area, it’s one of the greatest tragedies I have ever personally witnessed. Things like genocide and terrible environmental degradation became immediately personal to me on that day. It’s hard to say where one becomes personally responsible for fucking up; are these new owners but victims of a traumatic life, or should they be held accountable for ruining what was literally a place of magic? I can’t really say. But I will permit myself to say this: They did ruin it (with “landscaping”, they chopped up the fucking hillside, caused massive erosion, litter, etc.)
Because there had been “problems” in the past- e.g. 2 19 year old girls drinking vodka there nearly drowned- the park service was eager to “find a solution”.
At one point there were many ‘owners’; they consolidated and sold to this woman Janice, and her man I guess.
That’s how it goes. Perhaps you’ve also experienced a magic place in nature get destroyed. It makes me think about evil.
August 14, 2009 at 2:21 pm |
Did Doug really sell out?
The landscaping was so Jabba could get up the hill. The first year they lived right at the springs which was infinetly more disgusting.
plh
jsh
March 15, 2009 at 5:37 pm |
It really is sad when we see such blatant examples of humans being selfish and ignorant and their actions send negative repercussions out into society. Human behavior can be viewed through an ecological lens and all action are part of an interwoven network of human systems. A few years ago I found a beautiful hot spring in the Long Valley Caldera on the east side of the Sierra near Mammoth. I went back to the same spot the next year only to discover that the BLM had bull dozed this gorgeous spring that some wonderful sole had put so much work into developing. It was a very sad discovery and one I still have a hard time comprehending.
July 2, 2009 at 7:00 pm |
I’m in the Mendo area a lot. I found your site googling ” crab tree hot springs ” after seeing a photo of it. Are there any others that you recommend ( I’ve done Vichy and will go to Harbin soon ) . I’m looking for other small ones like this. I’ll search your blog though. You may have more info here already. Thanks for the update on this spring. ~Amanda
July 6, 2009 at 6:53 pm |
Hi Amanda, I’m not aware of any other undeveloped hot springs in the Mendocino County area. You might want to check out Orr Springs Hot Spring, it’s a nice place similar to Harbin. Wilbur hot springs is also a nice place. Both these will cost you some money, but they are very relaxing places and well worth it if you need some space to decompress from city life.
July 6, 2009 at 7:11 pm |
Thanks for the info. I’ll google Orr and Wilbur.
July 11, 2009 at 9:49 am |
I am deeply hurt to hear that Crabtree has been damaged. That beautiful, mysterious, healthy and spiritual spot has been enjoyed for thousands of years. I have visited there severa times over 30 years. We love the hot pools and cold creek, and the pungent lemony plants, the smelly boiling puddles, dancing lizards and sandy camping spots. It was always a great trip and we were just planning another visit. I only hope it can be repaired and restored to its non-developed state at some point in the future. How can we help?
August 9, 2009 at 6:42 am |
Passed by crabtree recently, and there was no sighting of the wicked witch, nor any of her nasty warning signs, just the trash dump she once occupied.
Want to help? It is always easier for any property signs to disappear than it is for the wicked witch to conjure them up.
Without property signs – who’s to say which is witch’s.
Some kind folks dis a real good job rebuilding the rock wall for the lower pool. It was nice and hot – so is the creek. Thank you.
August 6, 2009 at 7:20 am |
crabtree is open. The new legal owner decided not to live on the property this summer, and all “no trespassing” signs have magically disappeared. The springs have been rebuilt, and all is peaceful. Enjoy.
August 6, 2009 at 10:50 am |
Only an exceedingly ignorant person would want to “own” crabtree, and only a fool would purchase crabtree with the intention on turning a profit by selling to tickets to swim in the hot springs.
The new legal owner is an ignorant fool, and deserves absolutely no respect for creating a huge toxic waste dump of trash on the property.
The property is under county jurisdiction.
Please send your complaints about the trash to:
Sheriff Rodney K. Mitchell
Lake County Sheriff’s Office
1220 Martin Street
Lakeport, CA 95453
Thank you.
August 14, 2009 at 1:13 pm |
I used to be the ’servant’ of one of the owners according to the 300 hundred pounder and her swastica tatooed love slave that still lurk above in a bus. White tarsh to the Nth degree but post are correct and if you claim you hiked through the river they can not do anything. If you bring the dog dragging love slave a 12pk of Steel Reserve he is more social.
peace love and happiness
jsh
August 14, 2009 at 1:20 pm |
^ That description is really hilarious!
August 14, 2009 at 2:26 pm |
Glad you liked it – won’t go into details but the Sherriff knows the rest of the DD story.
Wanna buy a map? Every other hot spring in CA – Google S-11 geothermal. I have a guide available…
plh
jsh
August 14, 2009 at 1:51 pm |
Sorry I didn’t read through all the posts first.
If you want a responable person – the one fourth owner I was friends with – has moved to the Big Bend area – i don’t have his data but he is always at the local springs or Hunt in the morning and oops -he pops up in Round Mountian 530.337.6650 – He will clean the place up. His original goal upon purchase with the witch/love slave/sister was to keep it open to the public.
As Janice has eluded to the public can can be a royal pain in the ass. The first weekend Doug and a friend of mine went to his new property there where beer guzzling drunks shitting – fortunatly – downstream chucking cig butts in the creek and camping 3 feet from the pool refusing to move on and not accepting it was private property – not a nice experience. The second trip yielded a couple of 16 year olds drunk and passed out in the lower pool which emits the same gasses that have claimed lives at ‘Big Soda’
The trail to the place and the springs need to be deeded to the NF officially so the owners are not liable for the publics actions.
Hi Doug-Claus has done alot of work here-plh
August 21, 2009 at 3:13 pm |
CRABTREE HOT SPRINGS ARE PRIVATE PROPERTY! NO TRESPASSING!
Regardless of what you may have read on mansonfamilypicnic.com website, the hot springs are CLOSED TO THE PUBLIC!
The 160 acres with the hot springs are well posted, NO TRESPASSING!
If the signs are gone it is because someone who trespassed removed them, as stated above.
Rick Downy or someone who associates with him has obviously recently TRESPASSED as there are current pictures of the springs on his website.
Is it he who VANDALIZED my fourty-one year old Vintage Bus, breaking the front windshield and stole my property signs featured on his website?
TRESPASSING AND VANDALIZM ARE ILLEGAL! IGNORANCE OF THE LAW
IS NO EXCUSE!
NO TRESPASSING, NO HUNTING! STAY OUT!!! JANICE – LEGAL OWNER
August 28, 2009 at 11:09 am |
Janice, when will you lighten up and just allow people to use the hotspring? As they have for many many years.