2009 NM Day 3
We set out on Tuesday morning for Carlsbad Caverns. The drive from the town of Carlsbad to the caverns was across a flat and pretty boring countryside. Lots of cactus though. Prickly Pear, a red variety I hadn’t seen before along with the green. Lots of that tall spiky skinny cactus – can’t think of the name for it. Finally we drove up into a small mountain range and at the top was the Carlsbad Caverns visitors center. We decided to do as much as we could, so we took the Natural Entrance Tour. It is self guided, so you can stop and look around as much as you want and rest as often as you want. These are both very important factors since you descend 750 feet down a mile long trail with the grade at 20% for much of the way. 
We had gotten shoes for people who run on rock before our trip to Colorado last summer. I had a very bad experience where my regular Florida walking shoe had not kept a grip on a rock at the stream in Missouri, resulting in a nasty fall and a twisted ankle. We didn’t want a repeat of that, so we got these special shoes and they are the greatest. I think you could walk down a glass wall in them. They grip like a gecko’s foot, I swear. In addition, they have a really roomy toe box and cinch up really tight around the instep, keeping my toes from sliding forward and banging the end of the shoe. This is a necessity when you are going down such steep slopes for 3 hours. Yes, it took us 3 hours to descend – they say it takes an hour, but we like to really savor and see everything.
Here is the Natural Entrance – looking down – you can see how steep the trail is.
This is looking at the Natural Entrance from the amphitheater.The Natural Entrance to the cave was quite a sight. It is a big hole in the side of a rock rise, going dooooown. There is an amphitheatre at the top where at sunset you can watch millions of tiny bats swarm out to eat. But, right now the bats are in Mexico, lolling around, getting suntans and won’t be back to NM until mid March. So, we didn’t see bats – smelled lots of guano, however. Well, to be fair, we only smelled guano in the upper cave where the bats flew in and out. What they call Bat Cave is a cave much further back than the walking trail and that is where the bats actually reside. From the entrance, a very steep paved walkway descends with switchbacks. The path is quite nice and there are hand railings in most areas. It is quite an experience to descend a few levels and turn back and see the entrance as a circle of blue sky getting smaller each time we stopped and looked. The cave is extremely well lit and quite huge, so I never felt claustrophobic.
Looking back at the entrance as we descended – with the hole getting smaller and smaller.
Before they let you enter the cave, the rangers tell you how hard it will be and make sure you know what you are letting yourself in for. There are numerous signs around warning that sore knees and exhaustion may occur. I didn’t care, I was going to walk all the way down if I had to do it on my hands and knees (so to speak!) This was a once in a lifetime experience and I wasn’t about to miss it. For people who could not handle the descent, there is an elevator which takes you directly to the Big Room. Parts of The Big Room tour are even accessible by wheelchair, and I am very thankful I didn’t need to see it that way.
The trail went a long way back into the cave, descending all the way, with zillions of switchbacks, until we were at the opposite end from where we had come in. We could still see the daylight from the entrance. After another good hike, we entered the twilight zone, which is where the last of the natural light was. We stopped and took one look back at the tiny blue spot where we had entered and then pressed on into the subterranean world. From the VLA where they monitor the farthest reaches of the universe, to the depths of the underground cave world in less than 24 hours. What an incredible combination of things to do.
There weren’t very many people in this part of the cave, we probably encountered no more than 20 people the entire way. One thing I had never considered, a trail like this would be very difficult if you were afraid of heights. Each switchback would drop us a good way down and after every couple of those we would stop and look up at where we had just been with absolute amazement. Awe and amazement were the overpowering feelings. The place is so huge that it is hard to comprehend. We saw many beautiful formations on the way down, but the overpowering sense was how deep inside the earth we were going. We would often stop and look down to see where we were going – imagine looking down 20 stories and seeing the path you are going to follow to get there.
We took these pictures in one of the few narrow parts of the cavern. Keith said that the cave on Tom Sawyer’s Island at Disney would be totally disappointing after this.
This part of the cave is still very active, which means that you hear a constant trickle of water making new formations. The path is often wet, always steep and I came to love those trusty hand rails! They had really done a nice job of building the trails. There were frequent benches and resting spots with scenic overlooks and also frequent phones that you could pick up and call if you needed a ranger (which was comforting – what if you did fall, and survived? You would need help.) The lighting was very subtle and spotlighted the formations as well as kept the trial visible.
About ¾ of the way down we encountered a ranger on his way up. His job is to walk the trail and he says he makes 2 or 3 trips a day!!! Now 750 down is hard, don’t let me minimize the effort it takes on the calves and thighs to keep you in a slow descent, but 750 uphill? I can barely imagine it. Needless to say, he was young and very fit! No need for him to join a gym in that job. As we chatted for a few minutes, a solitary older woman on her way down asked him plaintively how far she had left. Poor thing was obviously regretting her choice! She won’t once some time has passed.
Any sound in the cave carries for a quarter of a mile they say, so you are asked to speak in hushed tones of voice. It was very humid in the cave, which we loved and stays a constant 56 degrees year around. I brought my jacket, but never put it on, staying warm by walking.
At the very end of the trail we had to climb several stories, which was not what our tired legs wanted to do! Once in the large underground area they call the Lunch Room, we could take a bit of a rest. This is where the elevator brings you from the surface and how you return. There are restrooms there and it is quite odd to follow a cave tunnel to a rest room! They don’t allow any food or drink except water to be brought in, but they do have a small concession area in the Lunch room. Everything purchased there must be consumed there so as not to attract outside animals in or otherwise contaminate the caverns.
The next tour was the Big Room tour which, mercifully, was mostly on level ground. This tour was also about a mile in length and also took us 3 hours! They say that the Carlsbad has the second largest cavern in the word known at this time and is the most beautifully decorated. It is very interesting, we looked at the pictures afterwards and it looks lots more scary than it felt while we were doing it. We saw amazing formation after amazing formation – practically every cave formation I had ever heard of and lots I hadn’t. Some of them were faintly creepy. This one reminded me of the monster Cthulhu from H.P Lovecraft’s horror stories. (In fact, Davy Jones from the movie Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End was a direct steal from Cthulhu.)
Depiction of Cthulhu Cave formation. After we completed the Big Room tour, we took the elevator back to the surface and that was the only time I felt claustrophobic. The elevator indicator numbers was in feet – 1 foot when it was at the surface and 753 feet when it opened its’ doors at our level. I was very interested to research the elevator and find that the original one had been installed in 1931 and became operational in 1932.
Our only regret about taking so much time in the cavern was that we only had 10 minutes in the gift shop before it closed, and our feet were so tired we didn’t look at all the ground level exhibits but had a snack in the little café instead.
We left Carlsbad (a charming little town, by the way) and headed back to Roswell. I called the Roswell Best Western and got Irene again and she booked a room for us that night. Our drive back to Roswell was a fine one and you better believe we were ready for bed that night! We woke up the next morning with sore legs!
We had gotten shoes for people who run on rock before our trip to Colorado last summer. I had a very bad experience where my regular Florida walking shoe had not kept a grip on a rock at the stream in Missouri, resulting in a nasty fall and a twisted ankle. We didn’t want a repeat of that, so we got these special shoes and they are the greatest. I think you could walk down a glass wall in them. They grip like a gecko’s foot, I swear. In addition, they have a really roomy toe box and cinch up really tight around the instep, keeping my toes from sliding forward and banging the end of the shoe. This is a necessity when you are going down such steep slopes for 3 hours. Yes, it took us 3 hours to descend – they say it takes an hour, but we like to really savor and see everything.
Here is the Natural Entrance – looking down – you can see how steep the trail is.
This is looking at the Natural Entrance from the amphitheater.The Natural Entrance to the cave was quite a sight. It is a big hole in the side of a rock rise, going dooooown. There is an amphitheatre at the top where at sunset you can watch millions of tiny bats swarm out to eat. But, right now the bats are in Mexico, lolling around, getting suntans and won’t be back to NM until mid March. So, we didn’t see bats – smelled lots of guano, however. Well, to be fair, we only smelled guano in the upper cave where the bats flew in and out. What they call Bat Cave is a cave much further back than the walking trail and that is where the bats actually reside. From the entrance, a very steep paved walkway descends with switchbacks. The path is quite nice and there are hand railings in most areas. It is quite an experience to descend a few levels and turn back and see the entrance as a circle of blue sky getting smaller each time we stopped and looked. The cave is extremely well lit and quite huge, so I never felt claustrophobic.
Looking back at the entrance as we descended – with the hole getting smaller and smaller.
Before they let you enter the cave, the rangers tell you how hard it will be and make sure you know what you are letting yourself in for. There are numerous signs around warning that sore knees and exhaustion may occur. I didn’t care, I was going to walk all the way down if I had to do it on my hands and knees (so to speak!) This was a once in a lifetime experience and I wasn’t about to miss it. For people who could not handle the descent, there is an elevator which takes you directly to the Big Room. Parts of The Big Room tour are even accessible by wheelchair, and I am very thankful I didn’t need to see it that way.
The trail went a long way back into the cave, descending all the way, with zillions of switchbacks, until we were at the opposite end from where we had come in. We could still see the daylight from the entrance. After another good hike, we entered the twilight zone, which is where the last of the natural light was. We stopped and took one look back at the tiny blue spot where we had entered and then pressed on into the subterranean world. From the VLA where they monitor the farthest reaches of the universe, to the depths of the underground cave world in less than 24 hours. What an incredible combination of things to do.
There weren’t very many people in this part of the cave, we probably encountered no more than 20 people the entire way. One thing I had never considered, a trail like this would be very difficult if you were afraid of heights. Each switchback would drop us a good way down and after every couple of those we would stop and look up at where we had just been with absolute amazement. Awe and amazement were the overpowering feelings. The place is so huge that it is hard to comprehend. We saw many beautiful formations on the way down, but the overpowering sense was how deep inside the earth we were going. We would often stop and look down to see where we were going – imagine looking down 20 stories and seeing the path you are going to follow to get there.
We took these pictures in one of the few narrow parts of the cavern. Keith said that the cave on Tom Sawyer’s Island at Disney would be totally disappointing after this.
This part of the cave is still very active, which means that you hear a constant trickle of water making new formations. The path is often wet, always steep and I came to love those trusty hand rails! They had really done a nice job of building the trails. There were frequent benches and resting spots with scenic overlooks and also frequent phones that you could pick up and call if you needed a ranger (which was comforting – what if you did fall, and survived? You would need help.) The lighting was very subtle and spotlighted the formations as well as kept the trial visible.
About ¾ of the way down we encountered a ranger on his way up. His job is to walk the trail and he says he makes 2 or 3 trips a day!!! Now 750 down is hard, don’t let me minimize the effort it takes on the calves and thighs to keep you in a slow descent, but 750 uphill? I can barely imagine it. Needless to say, he was young and very fit! No need for him to join a gym in that job. As we chatted for a few minutes, a solitary older woman on her way down asked him plaintively how far she had left. Poor thing was obviously regretting her choice! She won’t once some time has passed.
Any sound in the cave carries for a quarter of a mile they say, so you are asked to speak in hushed tones of voice. It was very humid in the cave, which we loved and stays a constant 56 degrees year around. I brought my jacket, but never put it on, staying warm by walking.
At the very end of the trail we had to climb several stories, which was not what our tired legs wanted to do! Once in the large underground area they call the Lunch Room, we could take a bit of a rest. This is where the elevator brings you from the surface and how you return. There are restrooms there and it is quite odd to follow a cave tunnel to a rest room! They don’t allow any food or drink except water to be brought in, but they do have a small concession area in the Lunch room. Everything purchased there must be consumed there so as not to attract outside animals in or otherwise contaminate the caverns.
The next tour was the Big Room tour which, mercifully, was mostly on level ground. This tour was also about a mile in length and also took us 3 hours! They say that the Carlsbad has the second largest cavern in the word known at this time and is the most beautifully decorated. It is very interesting, we looked at the pictures afterwards and it looks lots more scary than it felt while we were doing it. We saw amazing formation after amazing formation – practically every cave formation I had ever heard of and lots I hadn’t. Some of them were faintly creepy. This one reminded me of the monster Cthulhu from H.P Lovecraft’s horror stories. (In fact, Davy Jones from the movie Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End was a direct steal from Cthulhu.)
Depiction of Cthulhu Cave formation. After we completed the Big Room tour, we took the elevator back to the surface and that was the only time I felt claustrophobic. The elevator indicator numbers was in feet – 1 foot when it was at the surface and 753 feet when it opened its’ doors at our level. I was very interested to research the elevator and find that the original one had been installed in 1931 and became operational in 1932.
Our only regret about taking so much time in the cavern was that we only had 10 minutes in the gift shop before it closed, and our feet were so tired we didn’t look at all the ground level exhibits but had a snack in the little café instead.
We left Carlsbad (a charming little town, by the way) and headed back to Roswell. I called the Roswell Best Western and got Irene again and she booked a room for us that night. Our drive back to Roswell was a fine one and you better believe we were ready for bed that night! We woke up the next morning with sore legs!
posted by colbysmycat @ 3/03/2009 03:18:00 PM
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