Onondaga Cave (2)

Onondaga Cave is a wet cave. That means many of the formations are still active and the air in the cave is very moist. There is an airlock where the tour begins and ends. There are salamanders in the cave, but their numbers have declined with the bats (White Nose Syndrome); the salamanders eat the bat droppings and there are not enough to sustain as many salamanders and before. We didn’t manage to see any.

There is a river that runs through the cave. At one point you can hear the water moving but when you look at it from above it seems very still! They know where the water goes but not where it comes from!

On the way home we stopped at Bennett Spring State Park near Lebanon MO. It was raining so the only picture I took was of a painted glass window! We drove down to where the spring emerges and then back to I-44 along a road through the forest….lots of dogwoods in bloom in the understory. It was a grand finale to the day trip even with the rain!

Onondaga Cave (1)

My daughter and I visited Onondaga Cave State Park last week. I had made reservations for the 10 AM cave tour. The park is a bit over 2 hours from Springfield – almost all on I-44. We made good time and had time to look around outside before going in to join the tour. There were emerging plants in the pollinator garden (I only spotted one milkweed…hope there are more nearby) and a display about the Gemstone and Fossil Panning activity (we were focused on the cave but it would be a fun activity with children).

I used my small Canon PowerShot SX730 HS on the ‘night scene’ setting. It worked relatively well although the guide was using as flashlight and sometimes the light from the flashlight was needed!

The walk is about a mile….made easier by ramped walkways (i.e. no stairs). It is slippery in some places but there are handrails. There are a few low ceilings that could be hazardous for tall people, but the guide is very proactive about pointing them out.