7 Most Fascinating Hot Springs on Earth

Produced by the emergence of heated groundwater from the earth's crust, they are located all over the earth, on every continent and even under the oceans and seas. Many were created between 20 and 45 million years ago as a result of violent volcanic activity, and can reach up to 350°C (662°F). Meet some of the most fascinating Hot Spring on planet earth.

The Grand Prismatic Spring: America's largest

America's largest hot spring and third largest in the world, the Grand Prismatic Spring in Yellowstone National Park is about 250 by 300 feet (75 by 91 meters) in size and 160 feet (49 meters) deep, discharging an estimated 560 gallons (2000 liters) of 160°F (71°C) water/minute. The vivid colors in the spring ranging from green to brilliant red and orange are the result of algae and pigmented bacteria in the microbial mats that grow around the edges of the mineral-rich water, the amount of color dependant on the ratio of chlorophyll to carotenoids produced by the organisms. The center of the pool is sterile due to extreme heat. (Photos: Magadelic Rock and Bonnie Sue)

Mammoth Hot Springs: largest carbonate-depositing spring in the world

Also at Yellowstone, the Mammoth Hot Springs is the largest known carbonate-depositing spring in the world. The most famous feature at the springs is the Minerva Terrace — a series of travertine terraces which have been created over thousands of years as hot water from the spring cooled and deposited calcium carbonate. Over 2 tons flows into Mammoth each day in a solution. (Photos: Mila Zinkova, C Amalia and Thegreenj)

Blood Pond Hot Spring: welcome to hell

Blood Pond Hot Spring is one of the "hells" (jigoku) of Beppu, Japan, nine spectacular natural hot springs that are more for viewing rather than bathing. The “blood pond hell” features a pond of hot, red water, colored as such by iron in the waters. It’s allegedly the most photogenic of the nine hells. (Photos: L Plater and phototravel)

Blue Lagoon: Iceland's geothermal spa

The Blue Lagoon geothermal spa is one of the largest attractions in Iceland. The steamy waters are part of a lava formation, and a large swimming pool is heated with the run-off water from a nearby geothermal power plant. Superheated water is vented from the ground near a lava flow and used to run turbines that generate electricity. After passing through the turbines the steam and hot water passes through a heat exchanger to provide heat for a municipal hot water heating system. The water is then fed into the lagoon for users to bathe in. The warm waters are rich in minerals such as silica and sulfur. Bathing in the Blue Lagoon for therapeutic purposes is reputed to help some people suffering from skin diseases such as psoriasis. The water temperature in the bathing and swimming area of the lagoon averages 40°C (104°F). The spa is located in a lava field in Grindavík on the Reykjanes Peninsula, southwestern Iceland. It’s situated about 24 miles (39 kilometers) from the capital city of Reykjavík. (Photos: Diamanx and Sandro Mancuso)

Glenwood Springs: world’s largest natural hot springs swimming pool

Glenwood Springs in Colorado, USA, has the world’s largest natural hot springs swimming pool with a flow rate of 143 liters/second. You can soak in the therapy pool full of salty minerals at 104°F (40°C), or swim in the huge 98°F (36°C) swimming pool. (Photos: christoph.schrey and fishingfoolcool)

Jigokudani Hot Springs: home to the japanese Snow Monkeys

The Jigokudani Hot Springs in Nagano Prefecture, Japan is most famous for its so called “snow monkeys” — wild Japanese monkeys enjoying the naturally hot waters alongside the human visitors. More than one hundred Macaques --Japan's indigenous monkeys-- live in the Jigokudani Monkey Park, located in a valley called the "Hell Valley" for the volcanic activities observed there. (Photos: Duchamp and Tim Kelf)

Deildartunguhver: highest flow hot spring in Europe

This hotspring in Reykholtsdalur, Iceland, is characterized by a very high flow rate for a hot spring (180 liters/second) and water emerges at 97 °C, the highest flow hot spring in Europe. Some of the water is used for heating, being piped 34 kilometers to Borgarnes and 64 kilometers to Akranes. (Photo: Johann Dreo)

10 Geological Wonders you didn’t know

The Wave (between Arizona and Utah - USA) A red-rock stunner on the border of Arizona and Utah, The Wave is made of 190-million-year-old sand dunes that have turned to rock. This little-known formation is accessible only on foot via a three-mile hike and highly regulated.

Antelope Canyon (Arizona - USA)

The most visited and photographed slot canyon in the American Southwest, the Antelope Canyon is located on Navajo land near Page, Arizona. It includes two separate, photogenic slot canyon sections, referred to individually as Upper Antelope Canyon --or “The Crack”-- and Lower Antelope Canyon --or “The Corkscrew.”


The Navajo name for Upper Antelope Canyon is Tse' bighanilini, which means "the place where water runs through rocks." Lower Antelope Canyon is Hasdestwazi, or "spiral rock arches." Both are located within the LeChee Chapter of the Navajo Nation.

Great Blue Hole (Belize)

Part of the Lighthouse Reef System, The Great Blue Hole lies approximately 60 miles off the mainland out of Belize City. A large, almost perfectly circular hole approximately one quarter of a mile (0.4 km) across, it’s one of the most astounding dive sites to be found anywhere on earth. Inside this hole, the water is 480 feet (145 m) deep and it is the depth of water which gives the deep blue color that causes such structures throughout the world to be known as "blue holes."

Crystal Cave of the Giants (Mexico)

Found deep inside a mine in southern Chihuahua Mexico, these crystals were formed in a natural cave totally enclosed in bedrock. A geode full of spectacular crystals as tall as pine trees, and in some cases greater in circumference, they are a translucent gold and silver in color and come in many incredible forms and shapes. The Crystal Cave of the Giants was discovered within the same limestone body that hosts the silver-zinc-lead ore bodies exploited by the mine and it was probably dissolved by the same hydrothermal fluids that deposited the metals with the gypsum being crystallized during the waning stages of mineralization.

Eye of the Sahara (Mauritania)

This spectacular landform in Mauritania in the southwestern part of the Sahara desert is so huge with a diameter of 30 miles that it is visible from space. Called Richat Structure --or the Eye of the Sahara-- the The formation was originally thought to be caused by a meteorite impact but now geologists believe it is a product of uplift and erosion. The cause of its circular shape is still a mystery.

Blue Lake Cave (Brazil)

Mato Grosso do Sul region in Brazil (and especially the quiet town of Bonito) boasts many marvelous underground lakes: Gruta do Lago Azul, Gruta do Mimoso, Aquário Natural. The world famous "Gruta do Lago Azul” (Blue Lake Cave) is a natural monument whose interior is formed by stalactites, stalagmites and a huge and wonderful blue lake. The beauty of the lake is something impressive. The Blue Lake Cave has a big variety of geological formation but impresses mainly for the deep blue colored water of its inside lake.

Giants Causeway (Ireland)

An area of about 40,000 interlocking basalt columns, the Giants Causeway is a result of an ancient volcanic eruption. Located on the north-east coast of Northern Ireland, most of its columns are hexagonal, although there are also some with four, five, seven and eight sides. The tallest are about 12 meters (36 ft) high, and the solidified lava in the cliffs is 28 meters thick in places. In a 2005 poll of Radio Times readers, the causeway was named as the fourth greatest natural wonder in the United Kingdom.

Hell Gate (Uzbekistan)

Called by locals The Door to Hell, this place in Uzbekistan is situated near the small town of Darvaz. When geologists were drilling for gas, 35 years ago, they suddenly found an underground cavern that was so big, all the drilling site with all the equipment and camps got deep deep under the ground. None dared to go down there because the cavern was filled with gas, so they ignited it so that no poisonous gas could come out of the hole, and since then, it has been burning. Nobody knows how many tons of excellent gas has been burned for all those years but it just seems to be infinite.

Wave Rock (Australia)

The Wave Rock is a natural rock formation located in western Australia. It derives its name from the fact that it is shaped like a tall breaking ocean wave. The total outcrop covers several hectares; the "wave" part of the rock is about 15 meters high and approximately 110 meters long. One aspect of Wave Rock rarely shown on photographs is the retaining wall about halfway up the rock. This follows the contours and allows rainwater to be collected in a dam. It was constructed in 1951 by the Public Works Department, and such walls are common on many similar rocks in the wheatbelt.

Chocolate Hills (Philippines)

Composed of around 1,268 perfectly cone-shaped hills of about the same size spread over an area of more than 50 square kilometres (20 sq mi), this highly unusual geological formation, called Chocolate Hills, is located in Bohol, Philippines. There are a number of hypotheses regarding the formation of the hills. These include simple limestone weathering, sub-oceanic volcanism, the uplift of the seafloor and a more recent theory which maintains that as an ancient active volcano self-destructed, it spewed huge blocks of stone which were then covered with limestone and later thrust forth from the ocean bed.

10 Alien-Looking Places on Earth

Dry Valleys (Antartica) Antarctica's Dry Valleys, with their barren gravel-strewn floors, are said to be the most similar place on Earth to Mars. Its fascinating landscape, located within Victoria Land west of McMurdo Sound, get almost no snowfall, and except for a few steep rocks they are the only continental part of Antarctica devoid of ice. The terrain looks like something not of this Earth; the valley’s floor occasionally contains a perennially frozen lake with ice several meters thick. Under the ice, in the extremely salty water, live mysterious simple organisms, a subject of on-going research.

Socotra Island (Indian Ocean)

This island simply blows away any notion about what is considered “normal” for a landscape on Earth, you’d be inclined to think you were transported to another planet - or traveled to another era of Earth’s history. Socotra Island, which is part of a group of four islands, has been geographically isolated from mainland Africa for the last 6 or 7 million years. Like the Galapagos Islands, the island is teeming with 700 extremely rare species of flora and fauna, a full 1/3 of which are endemic.


The climate is harsh, hot and dry, and yet - the most amazing plant life thrives there. Situated in the Indian Ocean 250 km from Somalia and 340 km from Yemen, the wide sandy beaches rise to limestone plateaus full of caves (some 7 kilometers in length) and mountains up to 1525 meters high. The trees and plants of this island were preserved thru the long geological isolation, some varieties being 20 million years old.

Rio Tinto (Spain)

The giant opencast mines of Rio Tinto create a surreal, almost lunar landscape. Its growth has consumed not only mountains and valleys but even entire villages, whose populations had to be resettled in specially built towns nearby. Named after the river which flows through the region-itself named for the reddish streaks that colour its water-Rio Tinto has become a landscape within a landscape. The river red water is highly acidic (pH 1.7—2.5) and rich in heavy metals.

Kliluk, the Spotted Lake (Canada)

In the hot sun of summer, the water of Spotted Lake, located in British Columbia and Washington, evaporates and crystallizes the minerals, forming many white-rimmed circles: shallow pools that reflect the mineral content of the water in shades of blues and greens. It contains one of the worlds highest concentrations of minerals: magnesium sulphate (Epsom salts), calcium and sodium sulphates, plus eight other minerals and traces of four more, including silver and titanium.


The Indians soaked away aches and ailments in the healing mud and waters. One story cites a truce in a battle to allow both warring tribes to tend to their wounded in the Spotted Lake, "Kliluk".

Salar de Uyuni (Bolivia)

Bolivia's Salar de Uyuni is perhaps one of the most spectacular landscapes in the world. A magnificent area with an impressive salt desert (the world's largest), active volcanoes, tall cacti islands and geyser flats, it exists like an alien mirage, something completely out-of-this-world. Oddee's crew went there in July 2008, be sure to check it out.

Vale da Lua (Brazil)

Vale da Lua (Moon Valley) is a water eroded rock formation with natural swimming pools, placed on a river in the brazilian cerrado forest. Located at Chapada, 38 km from Alto Paraíso de Goiás, it’s rock formations are one of the oldest on the planet, made of quartz with outcrops of crystals. (Photo by: Alex)

Blood Pond Hot Spring (Japan)

Blood Pond Hot Spring is one of the "hells" (jigoku) of Beppu, Japan, nine spectacular natural hot springs that are more for viewing rather than bathing. The “blood pond hell” features a pond of hot, red water, colored as such by iron in the waters. It’s allegedly the most photogenic of the nine hells. (Photos: L Plater and phototravel).

The Stone Forest (China)

The Shilin (Chinese for stone forest) is an impressive example of karst topography. Its rocks are made of limestone and are formed by water percolating the ground’s surface and eroding away everything but the pillars. It’s known since the Ming Dynasty as the 'First Wonder of the World.'

The Richat Structure (Mauritania)

This spectacular landform in Mauritania in the southwestern part of the Sahara desert, called the Richat Structure, is so huge with a diameter of 30 miles that it is visible from space. The formation was originally thought to be caused by a meteorite impact but now geologists believe it is a product of uplift and erosion. The cause of its circular shape is still a mystery.

Eisriesenwelt Ice Caves (Austria)

Ice caves are very different from normal caves. They have a strange feeling about them, as though they are not from this planet, and one has just temporarily stepped into their world when spelunking their depths.

There are many ice caves throughout the world, but the Eisriesenwelt Ice Caves in Austria are some of the largest known to man. They are located within the Tennengebirge Mountains near Salzburg and stretch for a remarkable 40 kilometers. Only a portion of the labyrinth is open to tourists but it's enough to get a taste of what the remaining network is like: a truly mesmerizing palate of Mother Nature's handicraft