We've explored several caves in the Texas Hill Country. Natural Bridge Caverns and The Cave Without a Name are two of our local favorites. While neither is all that large compared to other caves around the country, both are living caves with active growth and beautiful formations. Since my son (we'll call him "Bubba" for the purposes of this blog and privacy's sake) is quite the geologist, he was quick to request a chance to visit some larger caves on our travels. Mammoth Cave near I-65 in the south of Kentucky seemed like a good place to start. With over 400 miles of surveyed passageways, it is by far the longest cave system in the world. Cave tours can be reserved online in advance, but we weren't entirely certain of the timing of our visit. The kids were especially interested in the Trog Tour, a tour for 8-12 year old children where they get to dress in coveralls and get a little off the beaten path on a tour without parents. Unfortunately, this tour was sold out by the time we knew our exact travel plans. We decided to drive on up from Tennessee and take whatever tour would be available.
As we drove past the entrance, I asked the kids if they were ready to see a mammoth cave - a really large cave. My daughter (we'll call her "Sissy" for the blog) suddenly realized that the cave is named for its size, not its inhabitants. She was very curious as to whether Woolly Mammoths had ever lived in the cave. I didn't think so, but we agreed that she could ask the tour guide.
We arrived with 5 minutes until the next tour was scheduled to begin - the Historical tour. The fee is $12 for adults and $8 for children. Rather than waiting for the next tour, we ran to the bathrooms, grabbed the camera out of the car and raced to meet the tour group. Our guide gave us some basic introductory information and safety warnings (narrow passageways, claustrophobia, lots of stairs, etc.) and we headed down the hill to the entrance.
When we stepped around the rock wall to the mouth of the cave, a cold gust of air hit us. While I expected the cave to be cooler than outside, I wasn't prepared for quite how cold the gust felt. I realized I had left the kids' jackets in the car, and we might just be in for a miserable 2.5 hour tour. We gritted our teeth and headed down the stairs into the mouth of the cave, anyway.
The size of the entrance and the first large room, called the Rotunda, were impressive from the start. This area in the historic entrance was used for mining saltpeter to make gunpowder during the War of 1812. Remnants of the mining operation are still visible. While the size of the cave is impressive, there are not many formations in this part of the cave. One of the most interesting things to see is the smoke writing and cave graffiti from tours in the 1800s and 1900s. Until the cave became a National Park in 1941, guides encouraged tourists to sign their name, and even charged a small fee to allow tourists to hold a candle on a stick to write their name in smoke on the ceiling. It's a little eery to see the beautiful handwriting from long ago in the cave graffiti.
The kids' favorite part of the cave was a section called "Fat Man's Misery." We found this section after descending down very steep and small passages to a lower part of the cave. It was a long stretch that was less than 18" wide from the waist down but widened a bit in the top part of the passageway. It wasn't much taller than my 5'6", so if you were tall you also had to stoop. This narrow section meandered in a winding fashion for quite a distance. Unfortunately, it was just too dark to get any good pictures in the depths of the cave - the flash was blinding and we were asked not to use a flash around the other guests.
Following Fat Man's Misery, we had an interesting climb up 6 or 8 flights of stairs on a metal tower that has been constructed to allow the tour to keep moving forward rather than retrace its path. This was the one section of the cave we were able to see on the Historic tour that had a few formations. The temperature was still pretty chilly, but we got one shot of the kids in the cave. Sissy finally got to ask her question about Woolly Mammoths towards the end of the tour. She asked if there had ever been any evidence of Woolly Mammoths discovered in the cave. There has not, as their range was in colder climates. There perhaps could have been Mastadon in the area, but no definitive evidence has been found. She was happy to get an answer from the guide.
The return to the surface felt pretty good - we were chilled through. We decided to hike on down the half-mile trail to the river. We warmed up immediately hiking in high humidity, and started to enjoy the cool vents where cave air escapes along the path. The trail takes you down to the Green River and the River Styx, along with the Styx Spring that feeds that little tributary. The kids posed by a large tree in front of the river. We explored a little along the banks, then realized that it was incredibly slick and we were lucky not to have fallen in the river.
When we hiked back up the trail and passed the mouth of the cave, another tour guide was starting a presentation to a group about to enter the cave. He was fascinating - I think we learned more from overhearing his presentation than we learned on our entire 2.5 hour tour. I asked another employee his name and was told he is Richard Howell. I'll request him as our guide if we ever go again. He mentioned that the temperature in the cave is around 54 degrees year round. No wonder we were cold!
We enjoyed a brief visit at the visitor center and museum - there was quite a bit of interesting information and exhibits about the cave system. There never seems to be enough time to see it all, but we were able to do a quick walk through. On the way out we stopped by the Park Store, and since we have been trying to visit as many National Parks as possible on our travels, we bought the National Parks Passport so that we can stamp our book at each one and keep track of where we've visited. We also found great Kids' Atlases by Rand McNally for under $4 each. They contain a detailed road map of each state along with facts like the state bird, tree, flower and more. There are activities that go along with each state, and more road activities in the back. We are letting the kids use a highlighter to mark where we go both on these books and on the larger folding maps we bought at the start of the trip. They are definitely getting some great geography lessons as we go. These books have been great to give the kids something productive to do in the car - a very competitive game of finding state license plates is ongoing at this very moment!
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