Terwilliger Hot Springs Trailhead — Attraction in Sweet Home

Despite having a terrible experience here, I feel obligated to give four stars because the only real issue with this place are the rude people who refuse to respect the rules and put others at risk.

You may have read online about the new COVID restrictions, and the truth is, the staff taking care of the area do take them very seriously. When you arrive, you get in line, and they let people go in as others are coming out. They also clean the area every Thursday, and at least in theory, there is no drinking or smoking around the pools, and people aren't allowed to bring their dogs into the pool area.

The problem is this isn't really enforced, and it seems the main reason is that there are only two staffers at the entrance trying to manage everything, and they really need a third person who is serious about the rules keeping an eye on the pool area. We saw two people smoking and one person drinking while we were there, which honestly wasn't a big deal in and of itself.

Our problems arose when the group that came in after us decided to bring their dogs and tie them up on the very last platform right by the pool area, where unfortunately we had left our things. They moved some of our things without asking to make room for their own stuff, then left their dogs there. The dogs proceeded to sniff through all our things, so I went up and moved them. To no avail... Since one of the dogs kept trying to climb down into the pool, his owner moved him right next to our backpacks, at which point I made the fatal error of asking her to move her dog.

You would not believe the verbal abuse that came out of this lady's mouth. She got right up next to me and was screaming into my ear. I honestly thought she was going to assault me. At this point, the man who had been drinking started yelling racial slurs at me and my wife (since we had been speaking Spanish together), and I realized we were in the middle of a forest with no authority around and honestly could have been lynched.

We packed up as quickly as we could and hiked out. I told the staff at the entrance what had happened (I was both scared and angry at this point), and they said that while they couldn't do anything because they weren't witnesses, maybe they would need to send someone back to keep an eye on the pool. Well, yeah.

I don't want to make it sound like the staff don't care about the rules--clearly they do. And if this hadn't been in the middle of a pandemic, those things would have been only minor annoyances. The sad thing is that there are selfish individuals out there who ruin public lands for the rest of us.

If you don't care about social distancing and just want to sit naked in a hot pool in the middle of the forest, this place will be a great experience for you. If you care about social distancing, are at risk, or are in contact with people who are at risk, maybe wait until there is a vaccine...

Update: There was a fire at terwilliger hot springs Sunday 8/19/2018 and due to this fire the hot springs will be closed for a year or longer. The fire wiped out all the structures on the trail.

I love this place although when I was here on 8/13/18 the Hornets and biting flies were really bad and I actually left early because even with having cuttters backcountry bug spray on they kept on buzzing in my ear. There are multiple pools and the ones higher up to the spring are more hot than the lower pools. When I cam in there was a family of 4 and a couple, but as I was leaving I saw over 20 people arriving. This place gets busy. The last time I was here was Easter a couple years ago and it was pretty packed. Someone had left food in the covered area to put belongings and the Hornets were super crazy in there due to the left behind food even though there is a trash can is on the way out and there are two bathrooms up the hill from the springs. You do have to pay $7/day or $66/yr to come here. If there is no attendant fill out a slip with payment put one in your car, keep a peice on you and drop the payment, same goes for when the attendant is there. There are vaulted toilets here and when I visited the toilets were really stinky and the trash was overflowing. There were 7 other cars in the lot when I arrived and when I left it was full. The road to terwilliger has been fixed from the rock slide but there are still portions that are gravel, so use caution...

I'll echo what was recently said here. The Aufderheide (Forest Road 19) is finally open (and newly repaved) from the north after 2 years of fire and rockslide-related closures. TURN RIGHT at the dam so that the reservoir is on your left the whole way. Go past the trailhead and you'll see a small parking area on your left. Parking is free, but there is $7 fee per person to go to the springs, paid by check or credit card to the person at the trailhead. It's an easy 15 minute walk to the springs. There is a bathroom in the parking area, and also at the springs. There are only 3 usable pools: very hot, medium hot, and warm. (The bottom one was damaged by falling trees).

As everyone mentioned, it's officially clothing optional, although there are also people with bathing suits. We were happy to see several families with young kids there this past week. We've been to this place MANY times in the past, both with our kids and without them. As always, we felt perfectly comfortable, everyone seemed very mellow, and we had a great time.

FYI: We came back a few days later and found it closed for cleaning for a few hours. Recommend asking about any...