There is something magical about a town where the creeks flow with hot water and steam comes out of every sewer grate. Native Americans declared Hot Springs a sacred area where any tribes, warring or otherwise, could all enjoy the hot springs in peace, and gangsters like Al Capone followed suit in the 1920s when Hot Springs became one of their favorite hangouts. I had originally planned to leave Hot Springs in the afternoon, eager to make up for days lost to recent storms that have helped put 2009 in the running for record rainfalls in Arkansas. But when I got into this charming town with rows of touristy shops opposite a stately row of old bathhouses, I started to get the feeling I'd be spending the whole day there.

I decided to start with a soak in the famous mineral baths of the Quapaw Baths and get a massage, and see how things went from there. As I was hunting for a parking spot for my bike, a guy called out to me from the porch of the visitor center. "Where are you headed?" I could tell right away by his leather vest, rose-colored glasses, and bandana-clad yellow lab ("She's my favorite girlfriend. She never talks back, and she doesn't shop!) that Charles was quite a character. He'd biked all over Finland and the US in his younger days, and I could tell he was a little jealous that he couldn't be in my shoes now.

He asked if I'd had any problems with irate drivers harrassing me, which, aside from the occasional yell from teenagers trying to be funny, I haven't. He described a few incidents he's had, one in which a driver swerved over to try to hit him, sending him careening into a ditch. Fortunately, a cop in an unmarked car right behind him saw the whole thing and arrested the driver on the spot. Another time, a truck driver yelled at Charles and told him to get off the road, that he was trying to make a living. Charles worked up some fake tears and told him he was going to visit his mother in the hospital. Worked like a charm. He suggested if anyone harrasses me, I tell them I've just been diagnosed with terminal cancer and this is how I've chosen to live out the rest of my days.

Once he bade me farewell and safe travels, I headed into Quapaw Baths for a luxurious soak in the white and blue tiled baths, fed by water from the hot springs which comes out of the ground at 143 degrees and is then cooled down to a very toasty temperature. They keep each of the four pools at a different temperature so you can mix and match accordingly. I was eventually called in for a very relaxing massage, in which I requested the therapist to concentrate on my shoulders, which have seem to constantly have knots in them these days. I'm not sure I believe that massage has any lasting long term effects, but it certainly has the wonderful short term effect of making you feel extremely well taken care of. It was a huge treat.

Afterward, I persuaded one of the front desk girls to take me down to the basement to see the spring that feeds all the pools. We tiptoed around puddles that have accumulated during the recent rains and she led me through a hot and steamy stone cave to the spring. I still can't quite get over the amazingness of this.

When I came out I was really in much too relaxed a state to get on a bike, so I had lunch at Granny's Restaurant across the street and stared dreamily into space. When I looked at my phone I saw that Seth, one of the CouchSurfers I'd emailed had written me back and offered me a place to stay that night if I still needed it. This was just the impetus I needed to blow off my bike ride for the day and spend some more time in town.

So, I started wandering down the row of adorable touristy shops designed to lure your money away from you in exchange for fudge, hot dogs, jewelry, and photos of yourself dressed as a wild west outlaw or pool hall floozy. I did briefly consider the floozy picture, but then a sign across the street caught my eye and tugged at the special heartstrings I reserve for slimy sea creatures: Aquarium.

The aquarium was sadly low on echinoderms (my favorite phylum, the only animals with five-part radial symmetry, including starfish, sea urchins, sea cucumbers, sand dollars, and brittle stars. . . yes, I'm a nerd) but high on all sorts of other oddball species, including giant cave cockroaches that looked like trilobites with legs, a lizard with a mosaic of red and orange scales and the best name ever, Togo Fire Skink, and, my favorite, albino African clawed frogs whose ghostly appearance and clumsy swimming patterns kept me mesmerized for some time. They also let a 30 lb. sea tortoise named Slowpoke wander the premises at her extremely leisurely pace.

From there I happened across a couple pools of steamy water in a park at the base of Hot Springs Mountain, and started wandering up the walkways until I realized I was sort of climbing the mountain and decided to commit fully to that endeavor. It turns out that biking ability does not transfer to walking up steep hills. I was winded when I reached the top, but amply rewarded for my efforts with views of a sizeable chunk of Arkansas. Just look at all that Arkansas!

But my adventures in Hot Springs would not have been complete without getting to spend a little time with Seth and Pixie Hendricks, two of the most awesome people I've me on the trip, true travelers who are busy making plans to wander around Europe for a year doing magic shows and face painting. Seth kept me entertained all evening with amazing stories from when he lived under a bridge in Austin and tagged along with a gypsy caravan in Arizona, punctuated by the spontaneous sleight of hand or mind-reading trick that left me astonished. The one that freaked me out the most was when I was asked to think of a number, perform a series of mathematical operations on it, and then translate the end result to a letter (a=1, b=2, c=3, etc.) He instructed me to think of a country whose name began with the letter (D, in this case) then add 1 and think of an animal whose name began with that letter (E). Lastly he had me think of the animal's color.

After furrowing his brow and staring me down for a few seconds, he said, "That's silly. There are no gray elephants in Denmark."

Dang it! If anyone ever does this trick again, I'm going to think of eels in the Dominican Republic instead.