Mt. Pleasant Classical Academy

Wednesday, May 21st, Early morning the boys packed up the campsite in 40mph, 92 degree heat, and it was only 7am. I was never so happy to leave a campsite. It wasn’t the destination I had dreamed about, no, it was not Eden in the desert. The night had been rough, hot and the 40mph wind rocked our tent continuously through the night. Not a restful night at all.

We drove west-northwest to Carlsbad City, NM only about 120 miles away. About 20 miles away from Belmorhea the air temperature dropped to 72 degrees! It felt so refreshing and I was still feeling a bit weak from the previous days ordeal. By 9:30 we were in NM and setting up a new campsite under a tree in cool 72 degree warmth.

Our next stop was Carlsbad Caverns NP and a hike into the cave’s wonderful 56 degree surroundings. Carlsbad is different than most other caves since it wasn’t formed by flowing water and as such the rooms are huge. SK convinced us to walk in using the natural entrance and I hid from him that I was worried about whether or not I had the strength to walk for an hour and whether my knees would hold out. The cool air of the cave was so refreshing and the first treat was watching Cave Swallows dart in the cave and their nest and back out to collect insects. We walked, we ohied and aied and walked down and down 850 feet where we walked around the BIG ROOM. The boys know their cave structures and pointed out cave popcorn, draperies, soda straws, columns, stalagtities, stalagmites, and compared what they saw to Mammoth Cave, Wind Cave, Jewel Cave, and the other caves we’ve visited over the last several years. We also joined a tour group into the Kings Room, gorgeous.

Back outside the boys agreed to sit around and wait for the bats to emerge from the cave. What wonderful boys I have. I had shared that one thing I always wanted to see were bats exiting from Carlsbad Caverns. I had seen photos of such a sight but here we were and I wanted to see it in person. The only problem was the 3 hour wait and what to do during all that time? We sat in the park’s book shop until it closed, had a dinner of summer sausage and water, and sat on a stone bench for the rest of the time.

Finally the ranger came and shared the rules; no electronic, no photos, no phones, no noise, and fingers-crossed the bats would appear. On cue the bats began to emerge, wave upon wave upon wave upon wave upon wave upon wave,….. for a full 25 minutes, thousands and thousands and thousands of bats flew out. We estimated that evening that we saw at least 200,000 bats exit that cave. What a grand sight!

Bats, a cool cave, and wonderful sons to share it all with. Only one thing would have made it better, having DH with us to share it too.