Vacation Post 12 - Black Hills Caverns

I'll get thru all of these vacation photos yet... you just watch me!

This time we're due West of Rapid City SD at the Black Hills Caverns which are a privately owned enterprise, but wonderfully maintained and quite fun, if I don't say so myself.

On this tour was our party of five, Me, Momma, Robby, Caleb and Aunt Molly joined by another dad and his two kids. One of which could out talk Robby and proved it all the way thru the hike.

This is the bridge over the creek outside of the mouth of the cave entrance...  somewhat obvious.

And we soon start our descent.

Not too many of these types of hairy passages, but it was nice that they did everything in their power to help you maintain your footing.  Note the rubbery mats on the ground around Molly's feet.

That's the back of Mom and Mollys head at the bottom of the photo.  This was the narrowest of all the passages and they also requested that you not touch the wall, which was really hard to adhere too and also really hard on my back. Thankfully, it did not take very long to get thru here.

Not down far enough yet?  Note the railings at the top of the photo. That's where we just came from.

Really cool to see these signs every so often, or at least until it soaked into my thick skull that we now have to go up 225 feet!!

And so the ascent begins...

I don't have many pictures of the ascent because it's a loop inside of the cave.  You go a ways into it before encountering a fork in the road, so to speak.  The first tour goes one direction, and the next tour goes the other direction and then your cross paths roughly half way thru the loop.  Meaning, you see that first part of the cave twice, once while entering, and again while exiting.

Once back with the living, Robby and Molly signed us in the guestbook and are filling out a survey card.

And while they're doing that, Caleb RongBo catches a rest in the old office chair.