ALABAMA
It is Bama’s biggest cave, and just 36 miles from Birmingham. How big? The main room is over 12 stories high, and wider than a football field.
Rich in history starting over 2,000 years ago as a Native American burial place Desoto Caverns, today, offers tours and special events like the upcoming holiday Sound, Light and Water shows.
ARKANSAS
Feel the need for more adventure? At War Eagle Caverns on Beaver Lake, in Rogers, they offer standard tours and also guided spelunking tours where getting wet and muddy is a guarantee. You will not be alone. The caves are also home to over 75,000 bats.
FLORIDA
www.floridastateparks.org/floridacaverns
It is amazing in a state surrounded by water, filled with water and sometimes just plain water logged dry caverns of stalactites, stalagmites, soda straws, flowstones, and draperies exist. But they do at a state park, located in Florida’s Panhandle and near the Georgia border.
Florida Caverns offers a 45-minute tour (moderately strenuous) daily except Thanksgiving and Christmas. Above ground find camping facilities, swimming, canoeing and boating.
KENTUCKY
A “grand, gloomy and peculiar place” is how Mammoth Cave National Park describes itself. Offering 15 different general tours, which range from just over an hour in length to 6.5 hours, this granddaddy of the caving world, is located in SW corner of the state, near Bowling Green.
Think your singing is great in the shower? Imagine sounding like Pavarotti or Popeye 140 feet below the earth’s surface. Makes plans to attend the free 28th Annual Cave Sing on December 2nd.
OKLAHOMA
A rarity exists in Freedom, OK - the largest public cavern of its kind. Stretching out for ¾ mile the cavern consists of alabaster, which is a rare form of gypsum. Recently Alabaster Springs State Park underwent a complete lighting renovation and now the colors of pink, white and the seldom seen black shine under the new illumination.
TENNESSEE
Ruby Falls, and its location Lookout Mountain, in Chattanooga, has a past as colorful as its name. From holding bootleggers’ cache to being a designated fallout center during the 1960’s Cuban Missile Crisis its most famous feature is the 145’ underground waterfall.
Millions of years ago tectonic forces collided creating mountains in Tennessee, but it was not until the 1920’s when the falls were found, and named in honor of the discoverer’s wife.
TEXAS
Is it any wonder that deep in the Hill Country there would be caves to explore? Near Burnet is Longhorn Cavern State Park. One of the highlights is Crystal City where hundreds of calcite crystals embellish a cave.
A variety of caving tours are offered, including one for a minimum of 10 people with a geologist.
VIRGINIA
She is the grandmother of all caverns in the southeastern states. Luray Caverns has it all from the Great Stalacpipe Organ (made from stalactites) to unusual formations resembling totem poles or waves of pure calcite spreading out in flowstones.
Like most of the caverns there are plenty of activities above ground, and the general admission includes entrance into the caverns and the Car and Carriage Caravan Museum.
WEST VIRGINIA
Hailed as the state’s largest caverns Seneca Caverns a guided tour here takes less than an hour. Named for the Native Americans who used the caves for shelter, flowstone formations are prevalent here. Gemstone mining is also available.
