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Sacred oasis escapes like Havasu Falls that will change you
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items Water is sacred. As a Native man I was raised knowing that, and every time I stand in front of water this blue in the middle of the desert I feel it all over again. This is my list of the most sacred, most unreal oasis spots in the Southwest — the tu...
Map
The one that started this whole list. That unreal turquoise water pouring over red rock in the middle of the Grand Canyon — pictures don't do it justice, they really don't. This is Havasupai tribal land, so you go with respect or you don't go at all....
Havasu Falls
A sacred emergence place for the Yavapai and Apache people — they believe their ancestors came up into this world through these waters. It's this insane limestone sinkhole in the middle of the desert, 55 feet deep, just sitting there full of the blue...
Montezuma Well
Travertine waterfalls and swimming holes so blue it looks fake, tucked into a wild canyon between Payson and Strawberry. This place is sacred to the Western Apache and Yavapai, and you can feel why — the whole creek is alive. You need a parking permi...
Fossil Creek, Arizona
One of the oldest natural health resorts in the country and these springs were sacred to the Pueblo peoples long before that. Multiple different mineral pools — the iron spring, the soda spring, the arsenic spring (sounds scary, it's amazing for your...
Ojo Caliente Mineral Springs, New Mexico
A perfect circle of the clearest blue water you've ever seen, right in the middle of the New Mexico desert. It's an artesian spring, 81 feet deep, constant 62 degrees — and it's a world-famous dive training spot. Free to swim, open to the public, and...
Blue Hole
Colorado's own sacred-feeling oasis — a travertine lake hanging off a cliff face with waterfalls pouring straight into water so clear it glows green. This one is FRAGILE, so they run it on a reservation/permit system now and you hike a steep mile up ...
Hanging Lake Trailhead
They call it Chocolate Falls and when it's flowing it's taller than Niagara — right there on the Navajo Nation in the Painted Desert. It's seasonal, fed by snowmelt and monsoon rains, so check conditions before you drive out there because the road is...
Grand Falls, Arizona
A slot canyon with two waterfalls you climb up via ladders, right in southern Utah. The water is cold, the canyon walls are glowing orange, and it feels like you're walking through somewhere ancient. You need a permit now (they cap daily hikers, whic...
Kanarra Falls
A real desert oasis — a grove of California fan palms around a spring, at the end of a 3-mile round trip hike in Joshua Tree. The Cahuilla people used these oases for centuries. It's not a swimming spot, it's a sit-quietly-and-feel-small kind of spot...
Fortynine Palms Oasis Trail
Natural hot springs tucked up in the Santa Fe National Forest — a series of rock pools getting cooler as you go down the hillside, clothing-optional, surrounded by pines. It's about 5 miles of dirt road to the trailhead and then a hike in, so it keep...
San Antonio Hot Spring