Carlsbad Caverns National Park, Carlsbad New Mexico

        

            Blackened heads and bodies of cactus and yucca litter the landscape, resembling alien life forms incinerated during an intergalactic war.  A human-started fire in July of 2011 charred 30,000 acres of Chihuahuan Desert in Carlsbad Caverns National Park.  I pick my way through the death, dismayed by the destruction one careless person has wrought.

Charred carcasses of Torrey Yucca (left) and Prickly Pear Cactus.

           At Carlsbad Caverns though, it’s not this scorched above-ground world that people come to see—all the action takes places 750 feet below the earth’s surface.   

        Inside the Visitor Center the elevator doors close and with a whoosh I’m barreling toward the caverns at the rate of 8.5 miles per hour.  In one minute I’m deposited inside the entrance to The Big Room, the major attraction here in Carlsbad.  As I pass through revolving doors the sight greeting my eyes is anything but wild.  A cafeteria, souvenir stands and rest rooms fill the area.

I follow arrows to The Big Room and am relieved to find the commercialization outside replaced by a natural wonderland inside.  A 1.2 mile paved trail with handrails winds its way through lighted formations.  The cave is filled with sweeping draperies, giant cake-like stalagmites, long willowy stalactites and bulbous, popcorn-like stalagmites.   During my two hour cave exploration I see and hear other people occasionally, but on this weekday in March my experience is one of relative solitude.

Draperies are formed when stalactites grow
into each other.

Several of these "layer cake" formations may be seen
in The Big Room.

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  The following morning I return to the park for the ranger-led King’s Palace tour.

Fifty-four other people join me and the ranger starts by asking for everyone’s home state.  New Jersey, Illinois, Vermont, Georgia, Texas, Colorado and Oregon are represented today, along with one person from Utah. (That would be me.)

We begin our journey and enter a series of chambers not open to the general public.  While we admire hanging draperies, stalactites and stalagmites the ranger tells of the cave’s discovery.  Early Indians were the first users of the cave but they didn’t venture much farther than a natural entrance.  In 1899 a ranch hand named Jim White discovered one of those entrances and he was hooked, dedicating the rest of his life to exploration of the caverns.  As I look around I decide it was mighty brave of Mr. White to be down here with only a dim, candle-lit lantern and no lighted paths marked “Exit” to find his way out. 

After learning more about the creation of this cave and the wonders it contains I have a question for the ranger: 

         “Are the caves ever vandalized?” 

         “Oh yes”, is the answer.  Many visitors touch or break off pieces of the formations.  At one point, rangers discovered 200 acts of vandalism in one month.  The park service’s message of preservation and protection obviously isn’t getting through to everyone.  

That being said, I highly recommend a visit to Carlsbad Caverns National Park.  You’ll be amazed by the mineral masterpieces in this underground showpiece.

A ceiling full of baby stalactites, also
known as soda straws.

A popcorn stalagmite, caused by
condensation on the surface.

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The easy King’s Palace Tour enables everyone from kids to Grandmas to see a restricted part of the caverns; however other, more adventurous tours are offered.  Reservations are required—sometimes months ahead of time—for all ranger-led tours.  Check out descriptions of tours and activities, as well as information about the creation of the caverns on the National Park Service website: www.nps.gov/cave

I started the day above ground on the devastated landscape.  It may be 30 to 40 years before this area recovers; if you’re visiting Carlsbad Caverns and would like to see healthy, undisturbed Chihuauan Desert wilderness, travel 36 miles southwest to Guadalupe Mountains National Park. 

This map shows the range of the Chihuahuan Desert.
The desert covers parts of New Mexico, Texas and the
country of Mexico.

A healthy patch of Chihuahuan Desert in
Guadalupe Mountains National Park, Texas.