RT - Day 20 (My Day in Hot Springs)

Hey ya!

Another adorable town in Arkansas! Hot Springs. Home to many, many gangsters and rows and rows of old time bath houses! Yes! This is my kind of place. :-) The bath house part...not the gangster part.

Just two of the two dozen bath houses on Bath House Row.

Three fun facts I learned about Hot Springs:
1. It was the very first National Park created in America!
2. This was where people were sent to get healthy and over their physical aliments.
3. All the heavy hitter gangsters frequented this location and were very good tippers, apparently. There is a Gangster Museum, but I didn't get a chance to tour it.
3a. I was told that in 2001 there was a shoot out in the downtown streets of Hot Springs by the Feds and the local Sheriffs because they disagreed on who would be running the drugs in this city. I guess corruption thrives here.

After my "build-your-own bagel" (of which mine was ham, fried egg and brie - yum) and some hot chocolate in a local coffeehouse I drove twenty minutes out to a place called Garvan Woodland Gardens to visit the glorious Anthony Chapel. My pictures don't even compare!

Visit the website for better pics.
http://www.garvangardens.org/photos-videos/default.aspx

This location is on the Ouachita River and it's the most intricate river system! Crazy! Here's Google.
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Garvan+Woodland+Gardens/@34.434613,-93.0492161,17z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0x8632d48b687875ad:0xd42e68f97d6b0ec5!8m2!3d34.434613!4d-93.047022

Small, subtle and pretty well hidden within the surrounding trees.

The inside just as gorgeous as the outside. It was dead quiet and so peaceful.

Oh...just one of those perfectly orchestrated babbling brooks we've heard about from our childhood books.
It's our youth come to life. Like something Snow White or Sleeping Beauty would see in her back yard.

Lake Ouachita, just a half a mile trail from Anthony's Chapel. It was so quiet here I could hardly believe it.
I want a summer house on Lake Ouachita with a boat in the water and enough rooms in the house for all my friends and family to share.

 

After my time in the perfection of these gardens I headed to bath house row and got a 20 minute mineral bath at Arlington Bath House.

 

1st - It's old...like original tile and plumbing old.

2nd - It took almost an hour before I was actually in one of the baths.

3rd - The bath was old! Like original tile and plumbing old...lol...

4th - There was a motor literally in my private bath tub with me that looked like an engine you'd find on a small boat. It was SO powerful that the bubbles moving through my small bath tub actually pushed me up off the tub bed so I was constantly fighting the current.

5th - This was not a relaxing experience for me.

6th - This was not a relaxing experience for me.

7th - I was disappointed this was not a relaxing experience for me.

 

So...I left and got a cupcake...okay two...okay three!!! All their flavors looked so yummy! I ended up throwing away most of the Lavender Lemon one because it tasted WAY TOO MUCH like lavender. Like I was eating my lavender Epsom salts from my usual tubs at home. The store name though was enough to bring everyone in...…...Fat Bottomed Girls...…. Yup. That's what those cupcakes get ya. I happen to like being a FBG and consider it one of my best features, but I don't want to be getting any more FBd than I am so I'll be staying away from these for a while.

 



 

 

Now I will leave you with the type of trees I've been looking at since I arrived in Arkansas. Just imagine the road lined with these!!! Incredible!

 



 

I'm going to go back to the Airbnb and heat up the pizza I waited 1hr 20min to get. I hope it's worth it. Wait...what am I saying...it's pizza...pizza is always worth it for some reason. :-)

Besos!
Kel