So today was the day that vacation really started for us. Carlsbad Caverns had been on both our bucket lists for a long time and now, thanks to the Covids, we were able to have a VIP level experience!
We knew that the Park Service was capping the number of persons in the cave to 25 and the total per day to 500 so we planned to leave our campground in time to get to the Visitor Center before it opened at 8:00. Not only did get there by 7:45, there were only about 20 people in line in front of us and we were able to get into the first group to go in.
Being well versed in queue placement for airline-overhead-access we somehow ended up at the front of our group 😉 which also had a couple of families with younger children. When we were at last released to go forth and explore, we gracefully put some distance between ourselves and the rest of the pack and by the time we’d entered the cave proper, we had Carlsbad Caverns ALL TO OURSELVES! (well, except for one other guy but he kept outa sight so it was OK).
Like that was going to keep us out 🤪
We’ve been in several other caves and seen an some impressive collections of speleothems – stalactites, stalagmites, flowstones, helicites, columns, etc. and Carlsbad has all those in abundance though not so much in intricacy – but the one thing that Carlsbad does have is scale, it’s simply humongous with large halls, chambers, rooms and many many branching passages.
and the best part is, after walking down 750′ below the surface, you get to take an elevator back to the top!
It was then off to White Sands …
The dogs loved it – the sand is actually very cool and firm and great for running or a good walk!
There’s not a lot of contrast, specially on a cloudy day so pictures of the dunes can be challenging at best …
After a bit of frolicking in the sand we headed up to Santa Fe for some much needed rest. 457 miles today, 2,427 total.
