April 30, 2013

Mammoth Cave National Park

The one thing about traveling in the cusp season is that you miss all the crowds, and often luck out with fantastic weather. This is my first visit to Mammoth Cave National Park, and I love it.

We arrived early yesterday afternoon - turns out it is only one and a half hours from our Maker's Mark stop - passing along that tip in case you are ever in the area. We had our pick of campsites, and found one that is lovely and shaded. This morning, signed up for the Historic Cave Tour, that lasted for 2 hours and took us deep into a portion of the cave system. One could spend ones live exploring all the tunnels underground. I had no idea what to expect. Sure, I've been in caves before, in Turkey, and Thailand, but this is nothing like those caves. This is the grandmama of caves. Indeed this is the largest cave system in the world, and most of it is still uncharted. Wow. And mammoth is right.


The lighting is awful for photos, and no tripods are allowed, so I'm sharing with you a postcard pic. It does not begin to do it justice, but you get a taste. With the all lights extinguished  it is the blackest black you can imagine, and there is no sound at all. I started to appreciate how getting sent to "the hole" could break someone.

And the icing on the cake? Mammoth Cave NP is a World Hertiage site. So another of those sites checked of my list of places to visit. How sweet is that?

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