Kartchner Caverns
We stayed fairly close to home this weekend so we wouldn't have to pay for a hotel or a dog sitter. Saturday afternoon we drove about an hour away to Kartchner Caverns, which is an Arizona State Park. We had to wait around for over an hour to join the 4pm tour because the others were full. While we waited, we had fun taking pictures outside in the hummingbird garden.
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| Saw more butterflies than hummingbirds in the Hummingbird Garden. |
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| Huge, beautiful grasshoppers! |
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| I believe this guy is a hummingbird moth. |
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| More beautiful butterflies. |
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| More beautiful butterflies. |
Inside the cave was pretty cool, although it was insanely humid (98%!) They even have us pass through an area on the way where we get sprayed with mist so that we don't impact the humidity in the cave. Despite feeling like we'd gone swimming fully clothed, it was a pretty nice tour. No photography was allowed in the cave, but that didn't upset me too much. I've been in caves before and no matter how much you try, the photos just don't turn out. Either they're too dark, or they just can't capture the scale of everything. Thankfully, that's why I pick up postcards!
The guys who discovered Kartchner Caverns were so protective of it that they called it Xanadu, as a code word between the two of them, so that nobody would know where they were going. Because of that, they named the largest formation in the cave Kubla Kahn. They save it for the last part of the tour and actually have people sit down on benches and watch a "light show" while a tour guide reads a passage from the poem Xanadu and then some "inspiring" music plays. That part was a little overboard, but in general, beautiful cave.
Lovely
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