Year 2 Day 13 The Caverns

After a yummy breakfast of eggs and bacon with lots of strong, black coffee, Mary Margaret and Wyatt headed down the campground road, jointly pushing a stroller. They would be staying in the campground while the rest of us would be exploring the Visitor Center and then touring the cavern called “The Rotunda”.

The Visitor Center is excellent with lots of displays that explain how the caverns were created, discovered, and what has been found inside the caverns. It is very educational as well as entertaining.

We next went outside to be part of the tour group and received a nice briefing by our ranger who would be giving our tour on what we were going to be seeing. There were 17 in our party. We then piled into the tram that took us up part of the limestone mountain that contained the caverns.

Once at the entrance, we walked through a series of big, steel, bank vault like doors, each time stopping to be locked within the cave. This was to prevent the natural cave humidity to escape as we moved deeper and deeper into the cave system. In the last enclosure, we were misted by misters mounted into the walls just to be sure that our clothes would not absorb any of the natural humidity within the cavern.

Once acclimated to the natural temperature and humidity of the cave systems (70 degrees and moderately high humidity), the last of the big steel doors was open and we walking into the cavern itself. We were greeted by huge cathedral like pillars, stalagmites, stalactites, ribbon flows, 20-foot-long straws hanging from the ceiling and walls, as well as a ceiling of various colors. It was beautiful, almost breath-taking. The tour was over after an hour and we saw and learned a lot. It was great to share this with the kids and grandkids.

We returned to LeuC and spent the rest of the afternoon enjoying our time with the kids and grandkids. After dinner, we once again lit a fire and roasted marshmallows. Mary Margaret and I retired for the night, tired but happy that we could spend this time with our kids.