Pansol Hot Springs

Geothermal resort district along the Pansol highway

Pansol is the strip along the national highway between Calamba and Los Baños where dozens of pribado (private) hot-spring resorts cluster wall to wall. You rent a complete walled compound — pool, pavilion, kitchen, sometimes a small house — by the hour or by the day, typically for a few thousand pesos for a family-sized place.

Quality varies. The cheaper places are concrete tanks and plastic chairs; the better ones (sometimes called exclusive resorts) have landscaping, slides, and clean changing rooms. Weekends are crowded, especially with Manila day-trippers; weekdays you can have a whole resort to yourself. Bargain on the rate, and check the water before you book — some pools run hot to the point of being uncomfortable.

things to do sight
A story
The springs are fed by the geothermal system of Mount Makiling — the same volcanic plumbing that drives the country's first commercial geothermal power plant, a few kilometres up the road in Tiwi-Tongonan country. Some Pansol pools come out of the ground at over 50 °C; resorts mix in cold water to bring them down to a tolerable soaking temperature.