Today we toured Carlsbad Caverns. On the way through Carlsbad we stopped at Albertsons and picked up fixings for tomorrows Christmas dinner. We used our national parks pass to save the $12 entrance fee and headed down the Natural Entrance trail. The Natural Entrance descends 800 feet over the 1 mile walk with plenty of switchbacks on the paved path. The scale of the caverns is really staggering, and it’s “highly decorated” (meaning lots of rock formations). At the bottom of the natural entrance, the path connects up with the Big Room tour circuit. We ate lunch 720 feet below ground at the underground cafeteria because the roadside signs told us to and we’re sheep, “Baaaa.” We also managed to score (steal) mayonnaise, relish and mustard packets from the concessioner contracted to provide lunches. (We would NEVER steal from the National Parks service directly.) Now I’ll be able to make a tuna salad! (1 pre-drained tuna packet, 2 packets each of mayo & relish, yum!)
The big room is more impressive than the Natural Entrance walk (which is still quite impressive, so if you only have time to do one, I’d suggest you take the elevators down and do the Big Room circuit. But if you have time, it’s nice to walk down the Natural Entrance to see how far the original explorers had to travel (and the type of terrain they had to do it over) to find the Big Room.
I also made a panoramic image showing part of the Big Room, click below if you have a fast internet connection:
