Hometown of Bill Clinton

Now we’re visiting Hot Springs.  It’s both a town (home of Bill Clinton!) and a national park.  It was the first national park for our nation.  It’s a bizarre park.  It’s fairly big, but surrounds the town.  We’re staying in the campground, which is in one section.  The visitors’ center is downtown in an old bathhouse.

The town is known for its baths.  It’s interesting to see how many famous people visited here for the baths.  Samuel Clemens, Babe Ruth, Al Capone, Jesse James, and Mary Pickford were all among the visitors.  The interiors and exteriors can be quite ornate to satisfy the rich and famous visitors.

Some things seem literally shocking.  They used a combination of electricity and bath waters for some treatments.  Mercury rubs were used for others.  Other things seem quite up-to-date.  The shower spray comes at you from all angles.  Some of the weight machines aren’t that far different from a modern gym.  We don’t use Indian clubs anymore, but they aren’t too different in the way they were used than the kettle bells that are popular today. 

You can still get a bath similar to the old treatments if you want.  It’s actually a fairly long process with a hot mineral water bath, sitz bath, steam treatment, shower, hot wrap, and cool down.  We didn’t do that, but we did drink some of the water.  Right out of the ground it is very hot (~140 F), so cooling it was better!