The Natural Bridge Caverns

The Natural Bridge Caverns

 

        When we pulled up to the Natural Bridge Caverns, I was pretty excited.  Not exactly out of control excited, but, excited.  Mom decided to snap a picture or two, then we went inside of the Visitor's Center for our real tickets.  After got our real tickets, the intercom screamed, "Tour group 'Discovery', please wait outside on the patio to your left."  We followed the few people who moved to the outside and took a seat.  Behide us sat a brick wall that looked pretty old.  Also, behind us, was the Natural Bridge, made from nature and real stone.  It is how the place got it's name.  I finally noticed how dry my throat was, and found a drinking fountain that said, 'Cavern Water'.  Well, if it's Cavern Water it was filtered by the limestone in the cave and must be pretty clean.  So, I took a drink.  Mmmm!  That was refreshing!!  It was cold and didn't taste like dirty water at all (well infact, it wasn't dirty water!!).  Finally, our tour guide, Jacob, announced that we would be moving into the Caverns.  I took a quick swig of water, and went along with the group.  We walked down a steep hill lined by flights of steps, then stopped for another break by the entrance.  Jacob said, "I will now tell you the rules and history..."  he went on about how Natural Bridge Caverns got it's name and how it was formed.  He also told us the rules like:  No touching!  And: follow the Caver's Creed.  Then we proceeded into the cave.  It was a great sight, but I didn't know that this was NOTHING yet!!  There were plaques with the names of the different formations and areas.  We came upon the original enterance to the cave.  The people who discovered this cave had to crawl through this hole to get inside.  Mom was glad she didn't discover this cave, because she didn't like tight spaces.  That space WAS tight!  Here we learned about Soda Straws.  Soda Straws are stalagtights that are very thin and are hollow in the middle.  We took a few pictures and moved on.  This place was beautiful!  Jacob, our tour guide said that the farther we got into the cave, the bigger the rooms got.  They were amazing!  They really did a good job when they named all of the formations, because they all looked like their names and they really made you look at the formation in a different way.  There was one formation named Fairy Castle, and it was dainty and delicate just like a Fairy Castle.  There was also a formation that was named King's Throne, or something like that, and it was amazing!  At the end of the tour, we went into the biggest room you can imagine.  It was soooo cool!  It was like a dome.  We had to hike pretty far to get to the exit.  Some of the formations looked really and  truly like wax!  It was very interesting.  I was dieing of thirst at this point, so I found a sign that said Cavern Water, and took lots of sips!  We were at the end of our tour, and we had great pictures, so we were in business!  Everybody got their picture taken at the end, but you had a choice if you wanted to buy it.  We decided not to, because Dad took some wonderful pictures himself.  We had such a great time!