Our morning held a big surprise as we began to drive. Evansville, Indiana was having quite the snow storm. Visibility was poor and the roads were becoming slick. Not the day we were expecting. Especially since our destination was Mammoth Caves. Inside where we were headed, the temperature is always in the 50s, and it is dark.
Fortunately, we drove through the snow storm quickly. We arrived safely at Mammoth Cave National Park. The sky was gray, but the weather was cool rather than cold.
Our first tour was the historic tour of Mammoth Cave. It is billed as a moderately challenging hike with some quick elevation changes because of staircases The beginning of the hike took us through the rotunda. It has a large circular roof because of how the rocks dropped from the ceiling. Our guide maintained what he called a leisurely pace. Not everyone agreed. Because it is a large tour, a couple of slower people can slow down the back of the group which make them late to the discussion, or they need to run to catch up. As long as you stay close to the guide, the pace is fine. The pace makes it necessary to take photos as you are walking since there is no time to stop unless the guide stops. (Hence some blurry photos)
We walked a short distance along a wide path to a place where we got a history lesson . It seemed this might be an easy hike after all, .
At our first stop we got a history lesson. During the War of 1812, Mammoth Cave was a large source of saltpeter for the gun powder used during the war. People were exploring all around the cave to find the best places to extract the saltpeter. Some of the wooden pits used for separating the saltpeter are still in the caves.
We also saw a staircase leading to one of the branches of the cave. In the lighted cave, it is easy to see where the cave branches off. It is difficult to imagine finding that branch high up on a wall using candles and torches as a light source,
As we continued our trek, the path got narrower. The walls began to close in. When we got to a very rocky spot, the ranger guiding our tour talked about the mineral deposits throughout the cave and how you could see various layers if you knew what to look for. He also said the trail was about to change.
He described two different sections that we were approaching: one is called Tall Man’s Agony and the other is called Fat Man’s Misery. He said we would know the reasons for the names when we got there.
Tall Man’s Agony was a fun challenge because the trail was so short. For much of that part of the cave you needed to bend and or lean the proper way to get through the passage.
After Tall Man’s Agony, we took a short break at some of the wells in the cave. Between the dark and the depth of the wells, you could not see the bottom of some of the pits. The ranger suggested it was a bad idea to lean too far over the railing. Shortly after the wells, we reached Fat Man’s Misery. It was more challenging than Tall Man’s Agony because in addition to being short very often, it was also quite narrow in places. We tried to keep from touching the cave walls any more than necessary, but in this section that was virtually impossible. This was another place where it would be a challenge to see getting through with just torches. Better make sure you brought enough of them.
After Fat Man’s Misery, we stopped at an area where many people had used torches to write their names on the ceiling of the cave. Many names had dates. The range of dates was from the 1800s to 1965. The ranger guide made an comment about the names on the ceiling. He said the names from the 1800s were historic artifacts, but the names from 1965 were federal crimes, so please do not write your name on the ceiling.
Then our climb back out of the cave began. Stairs can be boring, but these stairs had a great view.
The pictures are interesting, but they go from the bottom to the top as we walked up the stairs. The one on the right is actually the upper portion above the one on the left.
Here is a shot of a portion of the stairs we climbed on the way up.
From the stairs you get yet another view of the well in the cave,
From the top of the stairs, you can see the full size of the well, and the height of our climb.
We had a short narrow walk to get back to the opening where we came in.
This is not a shot of the lens cap. At an opening along the path, the ranger turned off the lights. The impact is not the same, but this is what we saw (or did not see?).
The last climb out of the cave was a transition from the cool cave to the outdoor environment. As we climbed out, we could see where some water enters the cave. We finished the last of the stairs on this tour and then looked back toward the cave.
Between the two cave tours, we spent time in the Visitor Center learning about Mammoth Caves. As the sign says, Mammoth Caves, with 400 miles of surveyed passages, is the largest known cave in the world. On the right is a cast version of the network of passages in the caves.
Our second tour was Cleveland Avenue. The National Park Service has created an artificial entrance into this part of the cave. It has a locked door and a steep stairway that leads to the cave.
On the way down the stairs, we saw a bat that was resting in the stairway. The picture is fuzzy because they asked us to not stop while walking by the bat. The first part of the cave we saw is less disturbed than other parts of the cave. This is because it is slightly more remote than what we saw earlier today. You get to see a more natural view of the cave with fallen stone and lots of rock piles. We got to see some of the formations of crystals on the ceiling of the cave. The crystals form many interesting shapes. By staying at the front of the tour we got to see the empty cave in front of us as the lights were turned on.
The path through the cave was well marked and mostly flat. It is different to be in a cave with no stalactites or stalagmites. At one point the guide pointed out another selection of the crystals on the ceiling. Many of them looked like spiders. The lighting in the cave did a great job of helping us see the path while emphasizing the unique features of the cave.
While the path is flat, it has a lot of gentle twists and turns. At some places you could see about a quarter of a mile into the distance when the lights were on. The cave really is mammoth.
At the end of this tour, our guide explained about our elevator ride back to the top. There is only room for a few people at a time. He said we could wait in the old dining room that had been built in the cave before it was a National Park. He told us not to wander far because it would be dark after the last ride. Without wandering too far, we went back into the cave a short distance to get one last selfie in the cave and to view the empty cave one last time.
There are several tours of the caves. We enjoyed the two that we chose. It was a cool time in the caves.