Kartchner Caverns

Monday morning we drove east to the very small town of St. David. The town is east of Tucson very near Benson. There is a lot of things to see in the area.

Our campground is lovely. It is one of the few desert campgrounds with trees and two small lakes with fish! One gentleman told me he caught a 5lb large mouth bass in the lake. It is catch and release so he's back in the lake to catch another day!

Ted noticed a problem with one of our jacks in the RV.  So rather than wait until it totally breaks on us, we had the repair man out yesterday and he's going to replace the gear mechanism on Friday. That means we will leave here Saturday instead of Friday, but better to get the problem fixed.

After the repairman left we went to the Kartchner Caverns State Park. This "live" cave was discovered in 1974.  In 1967 Gary Tenen and Randy Tufts were cavers and had received a tip about a sink hole. There was no opening yet so they left and returned 7 years later. They found a small hole that a person couldn't even fit through. What they found when they made the hole large enough to squeeze through, was a virgin cave! They kept it a secret for a long time while they worked with the owners of the property (the Kartchners) and the State of Arizona to protect the cave and made it into a state park. There are three parts to the cavern. The Big Room was the first part they discovered and it closes from April 15 to October 15 because there are bats that come back every year to have their babies in the cave! They even reduced the opening in the sink hole back to the way it was, for the bats entry way.  They have a "soda straw" that is over 21 feet long!

We toured the Throne and Rotunda Rooms.  Most of the formations are made of calcium carbonate and take many forms.  Dripping, seeping, flowing, pooling and condensing water create a stunning variety of formations!  Gary and Randy called their discovery, Xanadu and then when the found a massive column over 58 feet tall, they named it Kubla Khan!  It is amazing!  They estimate that they have been forming over 100,000 years but not more than 200,000 years!

There is no picture taking in the caverns so I'm posting a couple of post cards.

Amazing caverns..."Ain't Life Grand!"