Carlsbad Caverns National Park has the biggest cavern I have ever been in. This cavern is located in the southeast corner of the state of New Mexico. I visited this place in June of this year (2018). This is the first National Park cave system I have been into and it is well taken care of.
You go into the entrance and get the tickets. They have times of the year that bats will fly out of the caves in the evening, and there are tons of them. You can get tickets to view this as well at the cavern.
Once inside the cave, it wreaks of ammonia and feces from the bats above. If you keep walking away from the cave entrance the smell eventually goes away and then your in the dark to wind through the different areas in the caverns.
There are many huge rooms you walk through and some of them over look some pits, they go pretty deep. Theres a pit inside that they named the bottomless pit and if you look inside it is pitch black. There are also many small pools spread out through the cave.
At the end of the self guided tour into the cave theres an elevator at the bottom that takes you over 700 feet back to the surface of the earth. There are restrooms there, a snack bar, and a gift shop. I checked out the gift shop outside the cave, left the park and got some grub and headed back home to Phoenix. This underground world is fascinating!
“The cave you fear to enter, holds the treasure you seek” – Joseph Campbell
