Bathhouse Row is just the urban edge of Hot Springs National Park, which covers thousands of acres.  The park contains numerous hiking trails as well as dozens of thermal springs.  While HL and I did not do much walking, we did drive into the woods, to the summit of Hot Springs Mountain.  There we ascended the tower, a steel latticework, that the park service operates as a concession.  We paid the admission fee and elected to ride the elevator, rather than climb the stairs for more than two hundred feet.  The observation deck afforded us a fine panorama of the Zig Zag Mountains, the section of the Ouachita range that contains the park, the city of Hot Springs, and the surrounding Valley of the Vapors.  The Zig Zag Mountains are unusual not only for their sharply folded geological profile, but also for their orientation from east to west.  Almost all of the continent's other ranges run north to south.

HL in Hot Springs National Park

This poster depicts the previous observation tower, demolished in 1975 and replaced by the current tower in 1983.