Business and Pleasure–Day One: Mammoth Cave National Park

This trip would allow me to combine a little business (receiving recognition for my second book, Recorded Solo Concert Spirituals, 1916-2022) and a lot of vacation. My initial plan was to visit two national parks, including finally getting to Montana’s Glacier National Park.

I left home base before midnight on May 16th because I was scheduled to be at Mammoth Cave National Park in time to join a tour of the caves specifically organized for those with accessibility needs. Along the nearly 700-mile route, the Silver Bullet hit her 50,000th mile. I barely arrived in time, thanks to the park’s location within Central Daylight Time.

We took the elevator down approximately a quarter mile to the Snowball Room. The caves were previously privately owned, and the spaces were treated as a commercial venture for the wealthy. The writings on the walls were left by visitors.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The park ranger who led the tour gave us a lot of information about had been learned from exploration of the caves. The pace was leisurely to accommodate the group, some of us with walkers and others aided by wheelchairs or canes. I’ve posted a few of the pictures I took below:

As usual, all of the pictures are available on my Piwigo page at http://www.singin1.pics/piwigo/index.php?/category/Minneapolis-MN-Tour-051924.

Once the tour was over, I returned to the visitor center to get my NP passport stamped as well as my usual walking stick medallion and magnet. The ranger I talked with suggested I also tour the museum exhibit. It was a rainy day, and I imagined that any rush hour traffic I was bound to hit would be worse than usual. So I decided to delay my departure long enough for abbreviated tour. Again, a few pictures below:

My only disappointment from the day was that I didn’t have time to visit any of the tourist spots in Cave City, which was outside the park, nor the sites dedicated to President Abraham Lincoln, especially the Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historical Park. Unlike Mammoth, that site was within EDT, so I arrived at 5:05 p.m., five minutes after its close, rather than having 55 minutes to see it as I thought.

Just as well since I had a pretty long drive to my next destination.