Privacy Policy

Who we are

US Natural Hot Springs (usnaturalhotsprings.com) is a free directory of natural hot springs in the United States. US Natural Hot Springs is run by Alex Duplechain, who is the site operator and is responsible for the personal information described here. In this policy “we”, “us” and “our” mean US Natural Hot Springs and Alex Duplechain as its operator. It explains what information the site collects, why, who it is shared with, and the choices you have. The only way to contact us is by email at alex@usnaturalhotsprings.com.

The short version

• You can read the whole site without an account or giving us your name or email.
• We use Google Analytics and Vercel Analytics to measure traffic, and Google AdSense to show ads. Google uses cookies, which can include ads based on your interests.
• If you create an account, post a review, send a condition report, claim a listing or sign up for alerts, we store what you submit so those features work.
• We do not sell your name or email address, and we do not give them to advertisers.
• Some outbound links are affiliate links.

Information collected automatically

Like most websites, when you visit we and the services we use receive technical information your browser sends: your IP address, browser and device type, the page you asked for, the page that referred you, and the time of the request.

• Hosting. The site is hosted on Vercel, which processes these requests and keeps operational logs.
• Google Analytics. We use Google Analytics 4 to count visits and see which pages people find useful. It uses cookies and collects data such as pages viewed, approximate location derived from your IP address, device and browser information, and how you arrived. See How Google uses information from sites or apps that use our services. You can opt out with Google’s Analytics opt-out browser add-on.
• Vercel Analytics and Speed Insights. We use these to measure page views and page-load performance. Vercel describes them as not using cookies.
• Error monitoring. We may use Sentry to record server errors so we can fix them. It is set up not to send cookies, request headers, email addresses or form contents. When a form’s rate limit is exceeded, the event can include the IP address involved.

Advertising and Google’s use of cookies

We show ads through Google AdSense. Third-party vendors, including Google, use cookies to serve ads based on your prior visits to this website and to other websites. Google’s use of advertising cookies lets Google and its partners serve ads to you based on your visits to this site and/or other sites on the internet. These can include personalised ads (ads chosen based on your interests). Ads can also be non-personalised, chosen based on things like the page you are reading and your general location. Non-personalised ads still use cookies or similar technologies, for example to limit how often you see an ad, prevent fraud and measure performance.

Other third-party vendors and ad networks may also serve ads on this site through Google’s systems and may use their own cookies.

To learn how Google uses this information, see How Google uses information from sites or apps that use our services and how Google uses cookies in advertising.

Your choices:

• Turn off personalised advertising from Google in Google Ads Settings.
• Opt out of some third-party vendors’ use of cookies for personalised advertising at aboutads.info/choices (United States) or youronlinechoices.eu (Europe).
• Block or delete cookies in your browser settings. The site still works, though you may still see non-personalised ads.

Ads are labelled. They never affect which springs we list, how springs are ranked, or what evidence we show for them.

Visitors in the EEA, the UK and Switzerland

Where the law requires consent before cookies are used for personalised ads, as it does in the European Economic Area, the United Kingdom and Switzerland, Google shows personalised ads only after consent is collected through a consent management platform certified by Google. Where required, we ask for that consent. If you have not given it, Google shows only non-personalised or limited ads. You can withdraw or change your consent at any time, and you can also use the browser and opt-out controls above.

Depending on where you live, you may have rights to access, correct, delete, restrict or object to the processing of your personal data, to data portability, and to complain to your local data protection authority. To make a request, email alex@usnaturalhotsprings.com.

Cookies and local storage

• Advertising cookies set by Google and its partners, as described above.
• Analytics cookies set by Google Analytics.
• Sign-in cookies, only if you sign in. They keep you logged in between pages and visits.
• Third-party embeds and links. The lodging map on listing pages is embedded from Stay22, and partner sites you visit from our links may set their own cookies.
• Local storage on your device holds your saved springs, packing checklist ticks and light/dark theme choice. It stays in your browser, and clearing site data removes it. If you are signed in, your saved springs are also copied to your account so they follow you to other devices.

Information you give us

Accounts are optional. You need one only to sync saved springs between devices, post a review, mark a review as helpful, or claim a listing you operate. Accounts, the data below and uploaded photos are stored for us by Supabase, our database, authentication and file-storage provider.

• Account: your email address, a password (stored only as a secure hash, never in readable form), and a display name you choose. The display name appears publicly next to your reviews, so it does not need to be your real name. Your email address is never shown publicly. Account emails, such as confirming your address, are sent through our authentication provider.
• Reviews: the rating, text and spring. A moderator reads every review before it appears. Once approved it is public, shown with your display name only.
• Helpful votes: only the total is shown publicly.
• Condition reports: the spring, what changed, any notes and an optional photo. No account is needed. If you are signed in, the report is linked to your account so you can follow its status, but it is never shown with your name. Photos are stored with our storage provider at an unlisted web address and reviewed before they are shown on the site, so leave out anything you would not want published.
• Listing claims: the business email address and role you give us, used to confirm that you run the business.
• Closure alerts: your email address, kept on a list separate from accounts and used only for alerts about the springs on the site. A welcome email is sent through our email provider, Resend. Reply to any email to unsubscribe.
• Emails to us: if you write to us, we keep your message and address so we can reply and track corrections.

To prevent automated abuse, the forms briefly use your IP address to limit how many submissions one connection can make. That counter lives in server memory, resets within about an hour, and is not saved with your submission.

We never ask for your legal name, postal address or phone number.

Location and route searches

The “Use my location” button asks your browser for your location so springs can be sorted by distance. Your browser asks you first, and saying no leaves the rest of the site fully usable. The coordinates are rounded to four decimal places and put in the page address so results can be shared. We do not save them on our servers, but because analytics tools record page addresses, they can appear in analytics data.

The road-trip planner sends the start and end places you type, from our server, to OpenStreetMap’s Nominatim and the OSRM routing service to work out the route. They also appear in the page address.

Third-party services

When a page loads, your browser connects directly to some of these services, which then receive your IP address. Each has its own privacy policy.

• Google: AdSense ads and Google Analytics
• Vercel: hosting, analytics and performance measurement
• Supabase: accounts, database and photo storage
• Resend: email delivery
• Sentry: server error monitoring
• CARTO: map tiles, using OpenStreetMap data
• Open-Meteo: the weather forecast on listing pages
• Stay22: the lodging map on listing pages, showing places to stay from partners such as Booking.com and Vrbo
• Partner sites you follow links to, such as Amazon, Recreation.gov and Google Maps

We share personal information only with these service providers, so they can run the features above. We may also share it when the law requires, or to protect the site or its users from abuse.

Affiliate links

Some outbound links, including lodging and gear links, are affiliate links. If you book or buy through one, we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. The partner may use cookies or a tracking code in the link to credit the sale to us. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Affiliate relationships never change how a spring is ranked or what evidence we show for it. Which programs the site uses is set out on the affiliate disclosure page.

Your rights in US states

Residents of California and some other US states have rights over their personal information. Depending on where you live, these can include the right to know what we collect, to access, correct or delete it, and to opt out of its “sale”, “sharing” or use for targeted advertising. We do not sell your name or email address. Advertising and analytics cookies set by Google and other vendors may count as “sharing” or targeted advertising under some of these laws. You can limit them with the Google Ads Settings, aboutads.info and browser controls described above. To make a request, email alex@usnaturalhotsprings.com. We may need to confirm your request comes from you, and we will not treat you differently for using these rights.

Data retention

• Account data, saved springs, reviews and claims are kept until you ask us to delete your account. Deleting your account removes your profile, saved springs, reviews, votes and claims. Condition reports you sent while signed in stay, but are no longer linked to you.
• Closure-alert addresses are kept until you unsubscribe.
• Condition reports and photos are kept as part of the record of a spring’s conditions unless you ask us to remove them.
• Rate-limit counters are held in memory and reset within about an hour.
• Analytics, advertising, hosting and error-monitoring data are kept by those providers under their own retention settings and policies.

Children

This site is not directed to children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from them. If you think a child has given us personal information, email alex@usnaturalhotsprings.com and we will delete it.

Security and where data is processed

The site is served only over HTTPS, and passwords are stored only as secure hashes. Database access rules keep email addresses and unreviewed submissions off the public site. No method of transmission or storage is perfectly secure. Our service providers may process data in the United States and other countries.

Changes to this policy

If what the site collects or who it works with changes, we will update this page and the effective date at the top.

Contact

US Natural Hot Springs is run by Alex Duplechain. For privacy questions, requests and anything else, email alex@usnaturalhotsprings.com. Email is the only contact method; we do not accept requests by post. See also the contact page.