It’s the smallest of all the national parks. It was established to protect and preserve the mountain and the nearby bathhouses, known as the Bath Row, remnants from a booming rehabilitation and tourism area from about 100 years ago.

One of the bathhouses still operates and offers the same services offered 100 years ago. Since it was cold and gloomy on the first day, we decided to try out a traditional bath, which includes:
– soaking in a bathtub for 20 min
– laying on a bed under hot pads for 15 min
– sitting in a steam cube with your head sticking out for 2 min ( the longest 2 min of my life, not a big fan)
– dipping your tush in a small tub with super hot water for another 10 min
– finally a shower to rinse off
I added a 20 min massage which felt great!

We explored the mountain the next day even though the weather did not improve much. The fall definitely arrived over there. Got to see some yellows and reds.

On the second day before heading home, we went the Crater of Diamonds State Park, the only park where you can search for diamonds and keep everything you find. We were so hopeful on the way to the park. We were imagining how we would retire and live off all the diamonds we would find in the park 🙂 Well, I blame the weather. It was gloomy and it was hard to spot a sparkling diamond, which how most of the diamonds were found. After the rain the field was muddy. We played in the dirt for a little bit and after about 2 hours of finding only white rocks, we gave up.

We grabbed some food from Flying Fish in Little Rock and we were on our merry way back home.