Deep Creek Trip Prep
Navigate this guide
Deep Creek Hot Springs Overview
Deep Creek is a beautiful hot spring oasis along the PCT, just 2.5 hours away from Los Angeles, roughly 8 miles north of Lake Arrowhead. This mini expedition has a high adventure factor without requiring excessive planning, energy or expense.
Timing Your Trip
When to Visit
Year-around!! There are pros and cons to both:
Warmer Months - I’ve been on excellent group trips during spring and summer months. The cool river feels amazing on hot days, with cliff jumping rocks upstream from the main area (see below). The hot springs themselves are too hot during a summer day, but are a blast at night. The biggest downside to summer trips is that the main area gets very crowded on the weekends. If you’re looking for any privacy whatsoever, don’t go on a Saturday in June.
Cooler Months - If you can manage an overnight trip mid-week in January or February, chances are good you’ll have the place to yourself (or at least will be sharing it with no more than a handful of others).
How Long to Stay
Overnight - As a completely spur-of-the-moment trip, we left LA on Saturday around noon and arrived at the parking lot at 3pm after stopping for groceries. We camped out and hung out on Saturday night and began our hike out of the canyon on Sunday just before sunset. That gave us enough time to spend in the hot springs at night and swim in the river during the day.
Day Trip - Many of the people we spoke with at the springs hiked in just for afternoon. With the trailhead roughly 30-45 min. away from Hwy 15, you'll pass right by it on your way to/from Las Vegas or Zion.
Packing Your Gear
What to Bring
Fact: the hike in is every bit as hot as it looks (and it’s twice as hot on the way out).
This site has zero amenities. You won't find any bathrooms, tables, drinking water, electricity, trash cans or cell service.
Pack light. The hike itself is two miles each way and is steep at times. You’ll hate yourself on the hike out if you overpack and have to haul everything out yourself….especially on a hot day.
Here's a checklist of a few must-have items:
CASH - Have at least $30 on-hand per vehicle. Bowen Ranch keeps changing their costs, but there is a charge (I think $20 per vehicle), and it's cash only. If you don’t have cash, you’ll have to backtrack 30 min. each way to find an ATM. No joke.
A headlamp - This place turns pitch black immediately after the sun goes down.
Toilet paper - No bathrooms down in the canyon whatsoever and not a ton of privacy. Prepare accordingly.
Trash bags - One per person should be fine so you can easily split up your trash (find an extra thick bag if possible to prevent ripping).
Food that's easy to prepare - MRE's are the way to go on this trip.
Plenty of bottled water (or water filter & purification tablets).
Bring alcohol in aluminum cans & water bottles - glass is a huge pain to haul out.
An SUV or high clearance vehicle is preferable but not required.
Dogs are OK.
Pool floaties (duh)
Be smart with food & alcohol containers. Don’t bring glass! Our friends learned the hard way on one trip and had to haul a heavy trash bag out of the canyon. They hated it. On another trip, we walked by a pile of trash that had ripped through someone else's trash bag and spilled all over the trail.
Accessing the Bowen Ranch Parking Lot
Deep Creek is roughly 2.5 hours from Los Angeles near Victorville off Hwy 15.
Access via Bowen Ranch - There are several ways to access Deep Creek, the most popular has traditionally been via Bowen Ranch. The easiest plan is to type "Bowen Ranch Camping Lot" into Google Maps. It takes you straight to the Bowen Ranch parking lot.
DO NOT set your Google Maps location to "Deep Creek Hot Springs." It takes you on an impassable road meant exclusively for off-roading vehicles.
For more specific directions, you can find them here: Deep Creek Hot Springs via Bowen Ranch.
High Clearance Vehicles - Bring one if you have one. It will make your life easier. The dirt road becomes a little off-kilter in the last hundred yards before the parking lot. If you don't have an SUV, you'll be just fine without one. I've completed the last three trips in a Mazda hatchback.
Safety at the Springs
May, 2020: Trash Update
The main hot spring area was trashed last time I was down there on Memorial Day weekend……food wrappers everywhere, fully loaded coolers abandoned on the side of the trail, piles of human (solid) waste dangerously close to the springs. It was unbelievably sad.
Aztec Falls, just a few miles away, was recently closed for a year due to trash, graffiti and overcrowding. Jim Morrison Cave was shut down in 2016 for the exact same reason. Please pack out your trash and treat Deep Creek with respect, or we’ll lose access to it. Seriously though.
Don’t Drink the Water
DO NOT drink the hot spring or river water. Stagnant waters in the southwest region may contain a very rare but usually fatal parasite that causes amoebic meningoencephalitis. It's nothing to freak out over--just be mindful of it. Keeping your mouth closed under water is an easy solution.
Hangin' with Nudists
Yes, calm down--it's a popular site for nudists young and old, so probably not the best place for kids.
Seems like nudists are usually in the 30-50 range for age, and are surprisingly evenly represented by men and women.
We’ve been at least 5-10 times (most of the time with my own sister in the group) and no one has ever shown signs of feeling threatened or offended. People at the hot spring are generally very friendly and easygoing, and the philosophy behind the nudity is more in-line with being free in nature rather than being a perv.
If you do need a place to escape the crowd, there’s always open space somewhere along the riverbank if you simply keep walking.
Camping at Deep Creek
Hiking In from the Bowen Ranch Parking Lot
2020 Update - Part of Bowen Ranch’s original parking lot was recently acquired by another private land owner. The toll booth is still in place, and the attendees will tell you where to park your car.
Hiking from the new parking lot, follow these instructions to the original trail:
Hike along the fence line until it ends, step through the opening in the intersecting fence, and take a right.
You’ll come up to a gully containing (as of May 2020) an old boat and hot tub lying in the dirt. Continue past them and stay along the fence line.
Less than 100 yards after, you’ll approach the original trail entrance to Deep Creek, marked by a narrow fence opening meant for hikers, but prohibiting passage to ATV’s and dirt bikes. Take a left here and follow the familiar trail downhill toward the hot springs.
The hike in is a scenic two-mile trek from the parking lot. The trail drops into a canyon toward the PCT leading to a lush river bank with sandy beaches.
First time hikers should carry a copy of turn-by-turn directions. The trail is not always straight forward—there are a few turn options where the path meets up with off-road vehicle trails, which could potentially send someone in the wrong direction.
Note: Free maps for the hike in can be acquired from the Bowen Ranch parking lot toll station. They’re poorly made, so I’d recommend bring a copy of turn-by-turn directions from the link above.
Reaching the Hot Springs
At the very bottom of the trail near the spring, you'll have to cross a stream of knee-deep water (as shown in the photo here). Think fording the river, Oregon Trail style, except this river is more of a babbling brook.
Layout of the Hot Springs - The hot springs lie directly on the other side of the river, built directly into the side of a large rock feature. At one point, volunteers constructed a clever four-tiered cascade of pools, which flow down the natural slope of the granite. The lowest tier, feeding directly into a swimming area in the river itself, is the coolest in temperature. The three pools above it get progressively hotter (100+ degrees) as they reach the source of the stream.
You’ll also find two satellite pools that vary in temperature—one small tepid pool located behind the rock and one large hot (usually crowded) pool near the camping area on the river bank.
On hot days, the greater rock area around the river even has a slack line and small rope swing...tough to beat for natural SoCal swimming holes.
Camping on the Riverbank — Leave No Trace
Camping is technically prohibited down at the springs - The Bowen Ranch proprietors are clearly aware of it, but don't enforce rules for territories beyond their property. Rangers on the PCT can site campers, but I've never heard of anyone encountering them. My take--if you stay down there, be a part of the solution rather than the problem. Leave no trace. Treat the site with respect. If you see a piece of trash on the trail or at the spring, put it in your own trash bag (even if it's just one piece). Most importantly, NEVER spray graffiti.
For those who decide to camp - Tell the attendant at the toll booth that you'll be camping in the parking lot, not down at the springs. The sandy beaches along the river make for a beautiful campsite. We followed the river upstream and picked a campsite away from the main crowd & nudists. We had a great spot on the river that gave us peace when we wanted it, but was still just a 5 minute walk to the hot spring.
Photo Credit: Brian Richwien
Cliff Jumpiing
Yes, That’s Right, We Said Cliff Jumps…..Modest Ones Anyway.
Our two favorite spots are both less than a quarter-mile upstream from the hot springs themselves. The first ledge (roughly 35 ft.) is just past the second grouping of sandy beach campsites upstream from the hot springs (past the rocky area). The second spot is a little 20 ft. ledge a little further up where a trail from the PCT leads down to the beach.
Warning: Cliff jumping is really dangerous. You will have to gauge the safety of each jump at your own risk. Water levels fluctuate throughout the year, and from year-to-year. Do your regular depth checks. Do NOT assume that the rocks you see in our photos are automatically safe to jump. Never jump head-first.
30 ft. Send + Epic Backflop at Deep Creek Hot Springs
Additional Resources
Other Helpful Deep Creek Research
NobodyHikesinLA - Deep Creek Hot Springs via Bowen Ranch
Want More Adventure??
Check out our other popular blog posts:
