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| Mouth of the Carlsbad Carverns |
Carlsbad Caverns National Park is a National Park in the Guadalupe Mountains in New Mexico
. Beneath this rugged land are more than 119 known caves - all formed when sulfuric acid dissolved the surrounding limestone is the primary attraction ---the Carlsbad Cavern. At night, you can watch the nightly exodus of thousands of Brazilian (Mexican) Free-tailed bats from this cave.
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| Deep in the Caverns |
Carlsbad Cavern includes a large cave chamber, the Big Room, a natural limestone
chamber which is almost 4,000 feet (1,220 m) long, 625 feet (191 m)
wide, and 255 feet (78 m) high at the highest point. It is the fifth
largest chamber in North America and the twenty-eighth largest in the
world.
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| Stalactites and Stalagmites |
The forces of water decorated the cave in an almost endless array of
spectacular limestone formations such as this column and array of
stalactites.
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| More Stalactites and Stalagmites |
The park contains over 119 caves only 3 are open to the public. In the olden days the public climbed through the caverns on wooden ladders and it took 4 to 5 hours. Now, the public uses an asphalt path down and can take an elevator back up. Early explorers threw rope ladders down into the dark and descended. Can you imagine?
All of this has me thinking of the
Octoberfest Challenge 2014 sponsored by Toltec Jewels. Next month, a number of us are showing off the jewelry that we have created for this. I am trying to decide to go with a bat theme inspired by this trip or a spider theme inspired by my sister-in-laws fear of spiders. What do you think my
Bay Moon Design Online Store will feature as a result of this challenge?
What an interesting beautiful place!
ReplyDeleteI am envious of your vacation! You are so smart to do it now rather then putting it off. We, myself & my husband, did put it off and now he is disabled. Thank you so much for taking us along with you.
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