Thu 8/11 : Carlsbad Caverns

Perhaps I am simply more accustomed to long drives than I was last time around, but the drive from Austin to the edge of Texas did not seem nearly as interminable as last time. (It's still over 7 hours, but it seemed to go pretty quickly.) The first problem came when I got around to looking up the operating hours of Carlsbad Caverns. Much to my surprise, they cease to allow people to walk down the natural entrance at 3:30, and to go down the elevators at 4:00. Since Lynn had complained about my original plan to leave Austin at 6:00 am (sleepy head!), it turned out that we we're going to be just a little bit too late. Lynn suggested simply canceling our hotel in Carlsbad and continuing to drive towards Moab, but knowing how incredible the caverns were, I pushed to stick around and tour in the morning if we did not make it today. We decided to head there anyways in the hope that we would make it, which turned out to be a good call since we had failed to realize that we would be crossing into Mountain Time, thereby rolling the clocks back an hour.

Despite being there in time, we were unable to hike down the natural entrance due to some lightening that had been in the area previously, so we took the elevator down with plans to return tomorrow. As before, the caverns were incredible. Lynn, who had only ever seen some of the caves in and around Austin, seemed amazed. He very much seemed to enjoy playing with his camera, and getting some amazing shots.

Eventually, as we were taking our time to look around and get photos, the ranger who was ensuring that everybody was out of the cave before they turned off the lights showed up behind us. We wound up walking out with her, and getting to see each section of the lights get turned off, which was very neat to see. (For the technically inclined, the lights were controlled by Allen Bradley pushbuttons... Kinda wondering if there was a PLC hiding somewhere.) Lynn, of course, would be hard pressed to avoid trying to get a picture with a cute park ranger. Much less three of them.

Unlike last time, we both had smartphones, so we should not have trouble finding the good food in Carlsbad. Last time, as my loyal readers might recall, the restaurant recommended by the front desk of the hotel turned out to be fast food. The only place that didn't look horrible was Chilis. This time, though, we had our phones! And they told us to go eat at Chilis........