Carlsbad Caverns National Monument, NM | BAD TRAVELS

Carlsbad Caverns National Monument, NM

To start the slideshow, hover over the image below. Once you do that, arrows will appear so that you can navigate between the images at your own pace. Enjoy!

In the middle of the Chihuahan desert of the Guadalupe Mountains is another world. If it weren’t for the 1000’s of bats that fly out of the caverns en mass at night, it might never have been discovered. It’s well worth exploring if you’re ever in that part of the world. Check out the BLOG!

South eastern New Mexico

Hilly but still stark desert landscape

Checking out a small cave just inside the park, it was nice and cool in this little bit of shade

I was intrigued by this flowering cactus. I’d never seen it before and it was everywhere in the park. The largest were 2x taller than me and VERY thorny. A park ranger told me it’s called Ocotillo.

Walnut canyon, we thought the landscape all looked burnt and we were right. A prescribed burn was done last year to protect the area from a raging wildfire.

On the way to the cavern, just outside the visitors centre

This is the amphitheatre at the natural entrance to the cavern. It’s the seating to watch all the bats fly out at dusk.

This is the path down the natural entrance.

The smell of bat shit here was almost overpowering!

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I hope you can read this….we weren’t allowed in the bat cave, but based on the smell, wasn’t really disappointed about that.

Column

Finger like Stalagmites

Stalactites

Path was easy to follow

No pictures can convey how impressive this part of the cavern is. Wow was all I say when I got my first glipse of it.

When you think about how many years it takes to create these formations, drop, by drop, by drop it’s mind boggling!

Next page…..

Perfectly named don’t you think?

Not all the formations are named but if you use your imagination you can see all kinds of things. Hmmmm…..do you see what I see????

Dave thinks this on looks like….

A big boob! Told you there’s something here for everyone :-)

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Ladder pic is next

Can you imagine going down this in the dark and exploring the unknown? No thanks!

After more than 2 hours in the damp, 56F temperatures I was actually quite happy to be back in the hot, dry heat! It felt wonderful!

More of that towering, flowering cactus. It’s also called Vine Cactus, Coachwhip, Slimwood, Candlewood, Octopus Cactus, Flaming sword and Jacob’s Staff!

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