For something a little different today, we thought we’d go see a cave. Seriously. Off to the Ice Cave we went. It was about a hour drive each way. If we had to do it all over again, we wouldn’t have bothered. We can’t go into the cave, nor could we fit anyway. It was more of a cave opening with a frozen pond in it. I’ll start from the beginning. We arrive. It’s a privately owned tourist attraction. The property has a lot of old buildings on it; some even appear derelict. We went into the gift shop, greeted by a very upbeat lady who started explaining the trails before we even got up to her. $10.00 to see the Bandera Volcano site and the Ice Cave. Up the 1 mile round trip trail we went. It was OK. It was like a giant ditch. The property all around has tons of interesting lava rock all over the place. It was similar to our visit to Craters of the Moon. In fact, that’s how the Ice Cave was formed was from a lava tube. After the volcanic site, we walked another trail to the cave. About 3/4 of the way down the steps, you can feel the warm air change to frigid. Now that was neat. I even walked up and down a few steps to marvel at the temperature change. Warm air to walk in cooler. Remarkable.
My disappointment was that there were no icicles hanging like brochure depicted. Maybe that’s only certain times of the year or maybe that wasn’t even the cave in the picture. I also thought we’d be able to go inside of it more. If it wasn’t deep enough to go into then how about some lights deeper into it so we can see “more” of it. Hey you asked, so there it is. Oh, Jim just said you didn’t ask. My bad.
Above: Jim at the volcano.
Above: Here lizard, lizard.
Above: More volcano.
Above: View from the rim.
Above: Down to the Ice Cave.
Above/Below: Ice Cave: Ice is green from algae.
Above: Ceiling inside of cave entrance.
Above/Below: Rocks just outside cave entrance. With the sun it almost looks like it’s underwater.
Above: This is as far into the cave as we can go.
After dinner we went to the Sandia Tramway to catch a sunset. It was a little cloudy but it was still pretty.
While not as fascinating as some of your other adventures, the temp change is fascinating...
ReplyDeleteI really love the photo of the cave ceiling - now, that is "cool"!! So it was a little disappointing; at least you went to see it! I'm just sitting here on my duff, at my computer, waiting for you to show me the world.
ReplyDeleteOh, wait - I HAVE traveled far already!
Nancy in Atlanta
That whole temperature changing thing is pretty cool. And the colors in the pictures are so beautiful. The rust, the green, the sunset pic...also cool. And yeah as I look at the volcano pic I have to wonder if volcanoes are worse than earthquakes as far as the experience of it...hmmmm...guess it all depends on where you are right??
ReplyDeleteCool pics, Garret. I especially liked the neon algae ones. Oh, and the one's of you and Jim.
ReplyDeleteHas anyone told you that you are a very photogenic couple?