Hot springs in Alaska are plentiful thanks to the geothermal activity, but only a few are easily accessible from the road system. Take a break from driving during your travels through the state or up the Alaska Highway and enjoy a soak in one of these hot springs.
Liard Hot Springs
Liard River Hot Springs Provincial Park is a must stop when driving the Alaska Highway. The springs are in northern British Columbia and are open year-round. Visitors follow a wooden board for about five minutes to a hot springs pool (pictured above) with water ranging in temperature from about 108 degrees Fahrenheit to 126 degrees Fahrenheit.
Spend the night in the park campground, which has 53 sites, or stay in the nearby Liard Hot Springs Lodge.
Chena Hot Springs
Chena, the most popular and developed hot spring in interior Alaska, is about an hour drive from Fairbanks down Chena Hot Springs Road. Visitors can soak in an outdoor lake fed by the natural spring water or swim in an indoor pool.
If you want to stay on site, there’s a lodge, cabins, camping, and yurts. The resort also runs various activities, including an ATV tour, dog sled tour, and horseback ride. The Aurora Ice Museum on site is open year around and has an ice bar that serves cocktails in a glass made from ice.
Chena has an average temperature of 106 degrees.
Tenakee Hot Springs
This one is cheating a little bit because technically you can’t drive to Tenakee Springs, but it is accessible via an Alaska Marine Highway System ferry! Tenakee Springs is a small community on Chichagof Island in southeast Alaska with about 100 residents. The town originated because early prospectors and fishermen spent winters staying warm in the natural hot spring.
Today there’s a bathhouse in the middle of town that is maintained by local volunteers. The bathhouse has a stone tub that is about six feet by nine feet and five feet deep. Residents who don’t have baths or showers in their houses use the spring for bathing so the bathhouse has strict rules, including separate bathing times for men and women. The water flows at about seven gallons a minute and is 106 degrees.
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