Mammoth Caves

We met up with Chris and Annmarie at the Visitor's Center Monday morning, eager to go on our first cave tour: Historical Mammoth. This tour really just gave you an overview of the caves, how they were discovered and how they came to be a national park. Benji spent the whole tour at the back of the 120 person group asking the "trailing" ranger questions. He learned a lot more than the rest of us and was allowed to turn off some of the lights, which thrilled him:

It's hard to get pictures inside the cavern, but this gives a little sense of scope

A very narrow tunnel we had to squeeze through

After the cave tour, we ate at the lodge restaurant, which was very good

In the afternoon, we decided to try two short hikes to get a sense of the upper area of the park:

Abby and Aunt Annmarie, ready to hike

The first trail had lots of butterflies

 

In the Cedar Sink(hole)

 

Looking up from the sinkhole

Climbing out of the sinkhole

View from the top of the second hike

Benji, reading all the signs, of course (which inspired Patrick to do the same)

 

 After the hikes, we played a lame miniature golf course with a beautiful view and then had dinner at the Cracker Barrel, where the boys really enjoyed the giant checkers sets:
 

 

 
We took a second tour of the caverns on Tuesday before heading back to Tennessee. This was the "Domes and Dripstones" tour, and we saw an entirely different part of the cave system with all sorts of formations:

Wild Turkey, spotted on the way into the park

View as we descended 500 stairs

 

 

Frozen Niagara

Benji stayed with the trailing ranger again, this time joined by Patrick. The transformer for the lights in this cave was blown out by lightning earlier in the month and awaiting repair, so the switches didn't work. The ranger still let Benji play with the buttons

 

We took a picture with the tour guide and park ranger at the end, who were both very kind to Benji and answered all his (many, many) questions