Imagine yourself on a Sierra mountain trail. The only sounds are the soft whisper of wind through the pines, delicately perfuming the air, the melodious notes of a wild songbird, and the splashing of a waterfall. Walk along the trail, past the moss covered granite boulders, close by enormous ponderosa pines and to waters edge. Pause, breathe deeply, and remember this is the time you saved for yourself.  Listen to the sound of the water ---music for the soul---the sound of natures symphony.

    Look overhead at the azure sky, the drifting clouds, and dream, contemplate, enjoy the hawk as it circles slowly overhead in the sunny skies. Think upon the beauty of nature. As one guest told her companion in a soft voice "If heaven is as beautiful as this, I want to go there." Find your favorite spot whether it is "The Source" where the spring first emerges, the cascading stream where it drops into the "Fern Grotto", the Paradise Pond and Waterfall" with its golden willows, the "Emperor Tree" standing so alone and regal in a huge prehistoric looking outcropping or some other place known to you alone. 

    From the trails look below and you see a lake with an arched bridge reminiscent of one in Claude Monet's garden at Giverny and beyond that a two-story country house framed against jagged sunlit peaks of granite. The world, with all of its worries, seems far, far away.

There are more than 2 miles of graveled pathways for visitors to take a self-guided tour through

23 acres of wild gardens.

   Big Springs is a special place steeped in Gold Rush history. The old Wells Fargo Stage road ran through the property on its way between Bassetts Station and Sierra City and is still clearly evident today.

Imagine a stage coach filled with supplies, often gold, and passengers as they careened along that rough mountain road. Big Springs would have been a stop along the way where the horses could be watered, and passengers would alight to refresh themselves with  the cold pure spring water and the cool breezes.

Higher up on the property at the 7,000 foot elevation are the stone remains of the flume that transported water for a gold mine and sawmill deep in the mountains. The miners of Gold Rush days knew Big Springs and as late as 1960 there were traces of mine shafts and an old miners cabin that has unfortunately been lost to fire.

    Cascading down the mountainside, the spectacular 1,000 gallon-per-minute artesian spring that gives the garden its name, passes through old growth forest, massive granite boulders and fern grottoes, ultimately feeding the North Fork of the Yuba River.