Water Temple walkthrough in Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom

In The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, your journey with Sidon will come to its finale at the Water Temple, which you can access after Wellspring Island.

After you launch yourself up from Wellspring Island using the waterfall, you’ll be greeted with a fairly small sky island, called the Water Temple. Link and Sidon will talk a bit and you’ll be able to interact with the altar directly in front, unlocking the Water Temple as a fast travel location.

The temple itself is pretty small, but the puzzles can be brain scratchers and the boss is no joke. Here’s how to solve the Water Temple dungeon, and things to know before you get started.

What you need to know before starting the Water Temple

Once you have unlocked the Water Temple as a fast travel location, if you wanted to leave and grab more food and other material, you can do that freely without having to worry about trekking through a lengthy island again. We recommend having food, splash fruit, and arrows on-hand.

You’ll be tasked with opening up four more water valves to wash away the sludge. Below, we list the valves in order from left to right, but you do not need to do them in any specific order.

Sidon will also rejoin you, so you’ll need to interact with him to use his water abilities, like how you did during the Sludge Like fight. For the Water Temple boss specifically, you may want to hold on to any Zonai hydrant capsules you have.

How to get to the Water Temple

To reach the Water Temple, you’ll first need to complete the “Sidon of the Zora” quest from Zora’s Domain. It requires first traveling through Ancient Zora Waterworks to unclog them, then traveling to Wellspring Island in the sky.

Water Temple chests

• Zora shield
• Large Zonaite
• Strong Zonaite longsword
• 5 arrows
• Opal

Opening the first valve in the Water Temple

There’s only one visible way to head up the upper platforms right off the bat, so head to the southwest and jump up the platforms that create a somewhat broken bridge. Using the low gravity on the islands, Link should be able to jump and glide up.

Take out the three constructs waiting for you up there. Use a splash fruit arrow to clean mud off a clogged up waterfall floating in the air in the south. Swim up the waterfall to grab a Zora Shield from a chest.

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

A water bubble maker will be aimed at the upper platforms, but it’ll be covered in mud. Use Sidon’s trusty water ability to clean it off.

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

Use Ultrahand to take the glowing ball in the water and place it into a water bubble, sending it up to the higher platform. Jump into a bubble to meet it there.

Place the ball over the glowing hole using Ultrahand. It won’t go in, but it’ll float nicely over it.

Next, use Ultrahand on the nearby floating platforms and attach it to the top of the floodgate. Hit the platform to activate it and use Ultrahand to raise the floodgate. The water will drain out, allowing the ball to fall into the hole. This will open the cage, allowing you access to the wheel that controls a valve.

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

Use Sidon’s water ability to hit the valve, turning it on. Head back down to the main area of the Water Temple once you’re finished.

Opening the second valve in the Water Temple

The next valve is actually inside the Water Temple on a lower floor. From the broken bridge you took up to the first valve, jump down and follow this path to head under the temple:

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

Use Sidon’s water shield ability to run through the flames blocking the entryway. Once you’re inside, you’ll need to transport a glowing ball from one side of a spike pit to the entrance. Use Ultrahand on the floating platforms to build a bridge over the spikes and bring the ball forward. You can attach the ball to the platforms using Ultrahand to keep better tabs on it.

Remember that you need to hit the platforms (with a weapon, arrow, etc.) in order for them to float.

Fire an arrow at the floating platform with the chest to bring it down out of the sky to get a large zonaite.

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

Once you get to the wall, you can either use the platforms to build steps back up, or you can use Ascend on a floating platform to climb up quickly.

Attach the ball to the center of a floating platform using Ultrahand, hit and rotate the platform, and use it to insert the ball into the hole.

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

Use another platform to press down on the square switch by the door, allowing Sidon to join you.

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

Use Sidon’s ability to hit the now-open water wheel and return to the main area of the Water Temple.

Opening the third valve in the Water Temple

At this point, a construct may have appeared in the central part of the Water Temple, along with some chuchus, so take them out as necessary.

Fire an arrow with a splash fruit up at this clogged waterfall to the northeast:

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

Swim up the waterfall and take out the fire-like enemy you’ll see on the right. The chest it drops rewards a strong zonaite longsword. Ignore that area for now and keep heading this way:

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

Use Sidon’s water ability on the mud pile in the photo above to clean off a chest with five arrows inside.

Climb up the rubble and use Recall on a water bubble to float up to the higher platforms.

Use Ultrahand to attach the square pieces on to the waterwheel and then spin the waterwheel, allowing it to get enough momentum to keep spinning.

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

Grab the water bubble with Ultrahand and use it to connect the two electrical lines.

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

Use Sidon’s ability to activate the water wheel and jump back down to where you fought the fire like enemy.

Opening the fourth water valve

Use Ascend to jump through the floor where the fire like used to be. Take out the constructs and chuchus that are waiting for you up there.

After taking them out, use the water bubbles to clean the sludge off of the spinning structure.

Use the objects around to build yourself a tall platform near the spinning structure. From there, glide off and take out your bow and aim at the switch inside the structure. Time will slow down, allowing you to successfully hit the switch without too much fuss.

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

Grab the chest from the northern side of the now-drained pool to get an opal.

Once you hit the switch, the water will drain, giving you access to the water wheel. You know the drill: use Sidon’s ability to hit the wheel and turn on the last valve.

How to beat Mucktorok, boss of the Water Temple

Once you get back down to the central area of the temple you can now interact with the altar and the water will wash the mud away. A disgusting little creature, a Mucktorok, will jump out of the mud and you’ll need to take it out to actually stop the mud.

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

The Mucktorok’s fight patterns aren’t too hectic. It takes on a muddy shark form for most of the fight, which you’ll need to clean away using Sidon’s water ability. In its shark form, it’ll fire off several types of attacks that involve beams and waves that are low to the floor. Since the gravity levels are low, you can jump over both of these attacks without too much trouble.

Once it’s clean of mud, get a few hits in and it’ll start running away. If you hit it as it’s running, it’ll get temporarily stunned. We recommend locking on to it and firing off arrows to stun it. Repeat these steps until the boss is around half health.

The real problem hits at the halfway point, as it’ll start spitting mud everywhere. Admittedly, it was spitting out mud faster than we could keep up with cleaning it using Sidon’s ability, which is why we recommended bringing in extra splash fruit.

You can clean up excess mud with Sidon’s abilities and splash fruit — in fact, you should — as too much mud will make it hard to navigate around the arena.

You can also Fuse a Zonai hydrant to your shield or weapon to create an accursed hydrant fusion that’ll allow you to cleanse the area quickly. You should have found at least one Zonai hydrant capsule on your way to the Water Temple on Wellspring Island. You can also attach one to a Zonai homing cart if you have one, to create an automatic mud-cleaning Roomba of sorts. (Note that using the Zonai devices will eat your battery power, so it’ll need time to periodically recharge.)

Now when you wash away the muddy shark exterior, the Mucktorok will start jumping from mud puddle to mud puddle, making it harder to hit with your arrows. If there isn’t much mud for it to jump around to, it’ll be an easier shot.

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

We ended up using Keese eyes on our arrows, allowing our arrows to home in on the Mucktorok when it was out of its shark form, stunning it and letting us get some good hits in. After repeating this process a few times, the Mucktorok died.

After you beat the boss, a Heart Container will fall from the heavens and you can finish up the “Sidon of the Zora” quest line. Well done!

When ready, it’s time to continue the “Regional Phenomena” quest — assuming you have other locations yet to complete.