Hiking: South Lake Tahoe : A High Sierra Soak at Grover Hot Springs

Grover Hot Springs State Park in the High Sierra likes to pamper hikers. After a long day on the park’s scenic trails just south of Lake Tahoe, a hot springs awaits tired muscles.

Don’t expect a Baden-Baden-style luxury resort. Grover Hot Springs is your basic soak. The effect is rather like a 1950s-vintage back-yard swimming pool. Bathers can sit in a hot pool (102 to 105 degrees) fed by six mineral springs or in a cool pool. The pools and changing rooms are the extent of the facilities.

Tucked in Hot Springs Valley and flanked on three sides by Sierra Nevada peaks, Grover Hot Springs’ scenery is as soothing as its water. Granite peaks, including 10,023-foot Hawkins Peak to the northwest and 9,419-foot Markleeville Peak to the southwest, form an inspiring backdrop to an area that’s been attracting visitors since the 1850s.

At the state park, hot springs aficionados can read up on the exact mineral content of Grover Hot Springs and find out just how many grams per gallon of magnesium carbonate and sodium sulfate the waters hold. Unlike most other hot springs, Grover contains almost none of that nose-wrinkling sulfur.

Most visitors come to this out-of-the-way park for the waters, not the walking. That’s too bad, because the park and surrounding national forest boast some inspiring footpaths.

Easy family hikes include a nature trail--called Transition Walk--that loops around the park’s alpine meadow and a three-mile round-trip walk to a waterfall on Hot Springs Creek.

A more ambitious trail for those in good condition is the hike to Burnside Lake in adjacent Toiyabe National Forest. Burnside Trail crosses the state park, then ascends through a pine forest to the alpine lake.

Directions to trail head: From California 89 in Markleeville (a half-hour drive from South Lake Tahoe), turn west on Hot Springs Road and travel 3 1/2 miles to Grover Hot Springs State Park. You can park at the pool, then walk to the trail head, or proceed past the park entrance to the overflow parking area and the signed trail head at the north end of Quaking Aspen Campground.

The hike: The path parallels Hot Springs Creek, which flows year-round through the park’s large meadow. Some of the trout stocked in the creek are caught by campers for supper, though more serious anglers head for the nearby Carson River.

The quaking aspen that fringe the meadow are particularly spectacular in autumn, when the fluttering leaves turn orange and gold.

A short mile’s walk from the trail head brings you to a signed junction. The trail to the waterfall branches left from here, leading along Hot Springs Creek. Some minor rock climbing leads to an overlook above the small but vigorous falls.

Burnside Trail enters the forest and ascends a mile to another junction, this one with Charity Valley Trail, which heads south along Charity Valley Creek. Soon thereafter, Burnside Trail crosses Burnside Creek and climbs northwest, switching up steep slopes cloaked with Jeffrey pine and white fir. Near the top, you’ll get a grand, over-the-shoulder view of Hot Springs Valley.

The last mile of this hike resembles the first mile--a walk through meadow land. The meadow below Burnside Lake is much wetter than the one in the state park, however, so stay on the trail. You’ll keep your boots dry and help protect the fragile meadow ecology.

Boulders perched above the shore make fine picnic spots and inspiring places from which to contemplate pretty Burnside Lake.

Grover Hot Springs pool entrance fees: $4 for adults, $2 for children under 18. Hours: 2 to 9 p.m. weekdays, and 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. weekends.

Burnside Trail

Where: Grover Hot Springs State Park.

Terrain: Alpine meadows, east side of Sierra Nevada.

Distance: To waterfall is 3 miles round trip; to Burnside Lake is 10 miles round trip with 2,100-foot elevation gain.

Highlights: Hidden lake, soothing soak in hot springs.

Degree of difficulty: Moderate to strenuous.

For more information: Grover Hot Springs State Park, P.O. Box 188, Markleeville, Calif. 96120; tel. (916) 694-2248.