I bought the latest edition of "Hot Springs and Hot Pools of the Southwest" right before leaving. And today it served me well. Just outside of Thatcher I found the Watson Wash Hot Well using directions in the book. It's about three miles out of town, then down a jeep road.
There were three locals from the reservation cooking up a steak there, and a local rancher named Rudy who is selling alabaster on the Internet starting at $5/lb. His friend maintains the site for him, and he's sold some but would like to promote it more - but the URL he gave me didn't work, unfortunately. Rudy showed me a piece a reservation artist created for him. Nice stuff. He mines it himself. Nice guy, too.
So the locals finished their steak and took off, and we soaked for a while before leaving. Ah, what a way to spend the afternoon.
But that wasn't all. I headed further down the highway, entering New Mexico just before sunset. Nothing much but cactus and scrub brush out there, but beautiful and peaceful.
I'm writing this from yet another incredible place, Faywood Hot Springs between Silver City and Deming, New Mexico where I'm spending the night. I arrived here after dark and just took another soak. I like road trips! It's too dark for the camera (which worked wonderfully well today!) so look forward to tomorrow's episode in which Andy takes a soak and some photos, then drives a lot through Texas (personally, I'm looking forward to the soak the most).