Saturday July 23
Saturday July 23 we have plans to meet Amy and her Mom at Howe’s Cavern. The girls are so excited to see Amy although Isabella is very disappointed she will not be spending the night with us. We meet up with Amy and Mrs. Cook around 11:30. We buy tickets for the cave tour and then eat lunch at their restaurant. The food is very expensive but tastes good and we enjoy eating in the AC of the guest lodge. It is still humid out and we are looking forward to the 52 degree cave temperature. This is the 2nd cave we have visited on our trip but the experiences are so different. This is not a national park and therefore our tour tickets are more expensive (than Wind Cave) and we don’t enjoy the tour as much. At many points along the way, we are asked to go to the side so another group can pass us. They are trying to get as many people into the cave at a time to make a higher profit. We do have a very informative cave guide though. Unlike Wind Cave, this cave is very moist inside and we get to see (and at one point, touch) stalactites and stalagmites. All over the ceiling in the cave are pencil-like growths- these are the stalactites beginning to grow. This cave even has a pond in it where the reflection makes it look bottomless, even though it is only a few feet deep. This cave does not have any areas of really tight passageways or low ceilings where you need to stoop to walk.
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| Wind Cave with Amy and Mama Cook |
We take a boat ride at one point in the cave. The tour guides seat us and then uses the wall to push off as they steer us through the narrow river. At the end, they have us switch seats so that we are facing where we just traveled (instead of turning the boats around). They flip the seats and we move to the seat in front of us. It is really an ingenious idea and saves a lot of work on their part (and again facilitates that more people can see the cave). We stop at a rose quartz heart shaped stone in the floor of the cave where they conduct a few weddings each year. The heart is said to bring good relationship luck to couples or people standing on it. Scott and I are the first ones to stand on the heart and we overhear the girls saying we’ll have a 2nd honeymoon soon. I truly believe this trip was our 2nd honeymoon and Scott and I have as tight a bond as we’ve ever had, from spending so much time together. But we’ll take any good luck we can get too!
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| Bella |
From here the tour goes through the windy way. This is the part of the cave, I least like but is also very neat and reminds me of Polar Caves. It is a very tight and windy passageway. I am pulling up the rear because I stopped to take so many pictures and even though there is probably another tour group a few minutes behind us, I keep feeling like I am going to get lost and then the claustrophobia and panic set in. I stick close to Amy and Isabella who are with me and we make it out to the hot and humid world above the caves.
We enjoy a cold drink on the lawns of the guest house in the humid air. Isabella had worn my sweatshirt in the cave over her sweatshirt. She had her hood up which has a small amount of white fur around the face. She looked so cute in the pictures; almost like an Eskimo all bundled up. We decide to drive a few miles to see the natural entrance of the cave. The family had to sell off part of the land and there is a mining company located at the cave entrance and they are just starting to work on a museum as well but it was very disappointing. The cave entrance itself was enlarged back in the day to allow tours to begin there and is enclosed in a gated fence so that nobody can enter that way. The museum has a geology exhibit showing different rocks and minerals from the area that Dad would appreciate.
We say goodbye to Amy and Mrs. Cook and head back to Herkimer. Along the way we stop at a diner for dinner. In the diner, they have license plates hung on the walls and the waitress finds us a license plate from Delaware, the only state most of us have not seen on the trip. So now the debate: do we count the license plate we saw on the wall or not? I am inclined to think not…We get back to the campground in time to enjoy a swim and ice cream before bed. The pool is very busy and the girls swim while I watch them. There was only a few minutes left before the pool closed that I decided not to change and swim with them. When they do not kick us out of the pool at 8pm, I let them swim awhile longer. Soon I am uncomfortable being the only adult in the pool area with several groups of young kids so I pull the girls out. By now Scott has joined us and we head to the store for a refreshing ice cream.
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