Free, unimproved and half a mile off Highway 12, with a Forest Service order that closes it every night at 8pm. Here is the access, the trail and the rule that catches people out.
Weir Creek Hot Springs is free, has no permit and no gate, and closes every night at 8pm. That last part is a Forest Service order rather than a suggestion, and it is the single fact most guides to the place leave out. We fetched the nine pages ranking for the springs on 10 August 2026 and checked each one: two mention the 8pm to 6am restriction, seven do not.
The rest is straightforward. Park at milepost 142.1 on U.S. Highway 12, walk half a mile up the creek, and soak in a rock pool that runs somewhere between 100 and 104F. The trail is short and steep, the site is unimproved, and it gets busy on summer weekends with traffic out of Missoula.
The springs sit in the upper Lochsa River corridor on the Nez Perce-Clearwater National Forests, on the Lochsa-Powell Ranger District. There is no signed entrance and no marked turn. You are looking for a highway pullout and a footpath.
Park at the turnout at milepost 142.1 of U.S. Highway 12, on the south side of the road. It holds somewhere in the range of six to ten vehicles depending on how considerately people park, and there is a vault toilet at the pullout. On a July Saturday afternoon, cars overflow onto the shoulder.
Coming from Idaho, this is east of Kooskia and Lowell. Coming from Montana, it is west of Lolo Pass and roughly a ninety-minute drive from Missoula. The approximate coordinates are 46.4581, -115.0351, which is close enough to navigate to but will not put a pin on the pool itself.
From the pullout, the path climbs the east side of Weir Creek for about half a mile and gains roughly 200 feet. It is not a groomed trail. Expect exposed roots, loose rock, a stretch where the tread narrows above the creek, and fixed ropes at one or two of the steeper pitches.
That description matters more in shoulder season than in August. Wet leaves in October and packed snow in December turn the same half mile into something that has produced genuine injuries, which is part of why the Forest Service ended up regulating the site at all.
Highway 12 is the only road in, and it is a mountain highway prone to rockfall, winter closures and fire-season restrictions. Check the Idaho 511 road report for the highway and call the Lochsa-Powell Ranger District at 208-926-4274 for anything about the forest itself before committing to the drive.
The Nez Perce-Clearwater National Forests closed Weir Creek Hot Springs and the surrounding area from 8pm to 6am daily, with the order taking effect the week of 28 November 2022. The same order re-issued the existing overnight ban at nearby Jerry Johnson Hot Springs.
Read the wording carefully, because people misremember this as a camping ban. It is a closure of the area during those hours. Being at the pool at 9pm is a violation whether or not you brought a tent, and overnight parking at the trailhead is not permitted either.
The Forest Service was specific about the reason, which is unusual and worth reading. Lochsa-Powell District Ranger Brandon Knapton said at the time:
Unfortunately, a significant portion of the visitors to these hot springs do not follow responsible recreation guidelines, and some choose to participate in illegal behavior.
The agency listed litter, vandalism, drug use including cocaine and methamphetamine, improper disposal of human waste, and intoxication-related injuries that pulled first responders up that half-mile trail in the dark, as reported by Montana Public Radio.
Violating a Forest Service closure order is a federal offence under 36 CFR 261.53. It is prosecuted as a Class B misdemeanour, which carries a fine of up to $5,000 for an individual and up to six months in prison. In practice you are far more likely to get a citation than a jail cell, but "far more likely to get a citation" is still a bad end to a soak.
Forest orders get renewed, amended and occasionally lifted. The 8pm to 6am restriction was still the stated rule when we checked on 10 August 2026, but it is worth one phone call to the district office at 208-926-4274 rather than assuming a web page is current. Separate short-term closures also appear during fire season.
The main pool is a rock basin roughly ten feet across, fed by the spring and cooled by whatever creek water finds its way in. It comfortably holds a handful of people and uncomfortably holds ten.
Expect 100 to 104F. That is a warm bath rather than a hot tub, and it shifts with the season and with how the rocks have been rearranged since the last high water. There is a light sulphur smell, which is normal for the geology and fades from your skin within an hour or two.
Because the pool is fed continuously and unfiltered, treat it as surface water. Do not put your head under, and do not drink it. Idaho advises against submerging your head in undeveloped hot springs for the same reason authorities everywhere do: Naegleria fowleri, a naturally occurring amoeba in warm fresh water, enters through the nose.
Nothing. This is the part worth internalising before you drive two hours. There is no changing room, no drinking water, no rubbish bin, no lifeguard and no phone signal for most of the corridor. The vault toilet at the trailhead is the entire built infrastructure of the site.
Clothing is optional in practice, and there is no screening at the pool. If that is a problem for your group, this is not your hot spring. If you are visiting with children, the same fact plus the loose trail is worth weighing honestly.
The springs run year round. The variable is the trail and the crowd, not the water.
| Season | Trail condition | Crowd | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| June to August | Dry, dusty, easy | Heaviest, especially weekends | Arrive before 9am or accept sharing the pool |
| September to October | Good, leaf litter gets slick | Moderate, thinning fast | The best trade-off of the year |
| November to March | Snow and ice, ropes essential | Light | Highway 12 conditions decide the trip, not the trail |
| April to May | Muddy, high creek flow | Light | Runoff can flood the pool and drop its temperature |
Weekday mornings beat weekend afternoons by a wide margin in every month. The 8pm closure removes the one workaround people usually reach for, which is turning up after dark when everyone has gone home.
The list is short because the site is bare. Everything you bring comes back out with you, including the things you would rather not carry.
Leave the glass at home. Broken glass in a rock pool that people walk into barefoot is the reason several Idaho springs have been closed permanently rather than restricted.
Planning a wider Idaho hot springs run? Boat Box, about three hours south near Stanley, is the other roadside soak in the state that people pair with this one, and it is a completely different experience: a converted cedar tub beside the Salmon River with no hike at all. Our guide to Boat Box Hot Springs covers the access and the temperature problem you have to solve there.
Four things, in rough order of how often they catch people.
Arriving at dusk. The most common failure. People drive out after work, reach the trailhead at 7.40pm, and either turn around or break the order. Plan to be back at the car by 8pm, not stepping into the pool at 8pm.
Underestimating the half mile. Half a mile sounds trivial. Half a mile of rooted, rocky, rope-assisted climbing in flip-flops with a cooler is not. Two hundred feet of gain over that distance is a real gradient.
Assuming there is parking. On a summer Saturday the turnout fills by mid-morning. Parking on the Highway 12 shoulder on a blind mountain bend is how visitors to this corridor get hurt in ways that have nothing to do with hot water.
Treating it like a developed resort. No attendant, no rules posted at the pool, no one to complain to. The etiquette is entirely self-enforced, which is exactly why the Forest Service ended up enforcing something instead.
If Weir Creek is the plan, do this in order: check Idaho 511 for Highway 12, call the ranger district on 208-926-4274 to confirm the closure hours and any fire-season order, and set your turnaround time so you are at the car by 8pm. Then drive out early on a weekday and you will likely have the pool to yourself for the first hour.
If that sounds like more logistics than a soak is worth, the honest answer is that this is a two-hour round trip from Missoula for a ten-foot rock pool with no facilities, and it is worth it mainly if the drive up the Lochsa is part of the appeal for you. It usually is.
Yes. There is no entry fee, no day-use fee and no permit. It sits on Nez Perce-Clearwater National Forest land and is unimproved, which also means there are no staff, no lifeguards and no drinking water.
8pm. A Forest Service order closes the springs and the surrounding area from 8pm to 6am daily. It has been in force since late November 2022 and covers being in the area at all, not just camping there.
About half a mile each way from the Highway 12 turnout at milepost 142.1, climbing roughly 200 feet along the creek. Expect roots, loose rock and one or two spots where a fixed rope helps.
Roughly 100 to 104F in the main pool, varying with the season and with how much cold creek water is diverted into it. That is bath temperature, not scalding.
Not at the springs or the trailhead. The night closure makes overnight presence there a violation. Dispersed camping is legal elsewhere in the surrounding national forest at the required distance from water.
In practice, yes, and you should expect to encounter nude bathers. There is no changing structure and no privacy screen at the pool.
Dogs are allowed on the trail and must be under control. Keeping them out of the soaking pool is basic courtesy, and a hot pool is a poor place for a dog in any case.
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