Castle Hot Springs

Confusion between indigenous petroglyphs and Egyptian hieroglyphs led to the name of a sprawl of rugged Hieroglyphic Mountains west of present-day Phoenix. In 1865, Army Colonel Charles Craig led a troop of soldiers pursuing Yavapai Indians through the misnomered mountains and remarked that the peaks looked like castles. The troop stumbled upon hot springs that flowed into a desert wash and named them Castle Hot Springs and Castle Creek. The wash became a road, and the hot springs became a resort.

An underground reservoir pushes out 200,000 gallons of 122-degree water daily. Indigenous peoples had long frequented the hot spring for its supposed healing powers. In 1896, the enterprising Arizonan Frank Murphy began luring people to the Castle Hot Springs, and they've been coming ever since. Eastern dandies wintered at the remote hot springs resort, including Theodore Roosevelt, the Wrigleys, Rockefellers, Cabots, and Carnegies. During World War II, the Defense Department commandeered the spa to serve as a recuperation facility for wounded servicemen. Its most famous patient was future President John F Kennedy, who spent the winter of 1945 recovering from injuries suffered when his boat, PT109, was destroyed. A 1976 fire destroyed much of the resort, but it has reopened. The palm trees around the resort are not native to Arizona.

The resort is not the only feature of this highly scenic drive. Castle Hot Spring Road passes the scenic Lake Pleasant Reservoir before dropping into Castle Creek. Feral burros roam the rugged landscape and are often seen from the trail. The center of the trail follows a colorful canyon formed by Bitter Creek. Remnants of present and past mining operations and cattle ranches dot the surrounding hills and mountains. Each switchback reveals another vast vista of a rugged mountainous landscape, and connecting trails beg for further exploration.