Written on 10-27-15.
Belinda and I were overwhelmed with happiness after visiting the Carlsbad Caverns. It’s an experience I know I will never forget, and it was so unique that it was well worth the trip way down south. It started two nights ago when we arrived after our visit with the children. The timing worked out so perfectly. We got to the Caverns just before dusk, the time when the bats come out of the main cave’s entrance. There was a time change issue, too, so we thought we were going to miss it, but after coming out of Texas, we gained back one hour, so we had plenty of time to not only see the bats as they made their exit, but listen to and learn from a knowledgeable park ranger moments before that.
The ranger stood at the bottom of the auditorium, where the seats were all made from stones. Belinda and I chose to stand up at the top, glad to have a break from sitting. Behind the ranger was...
the cavernous maw, the main entrance for both tourists and bats. She was an “edutainer” as she was full of info and extra tidbits of knowledge and anecdotes. For example, she explained what types of bats would be flying out (Brazilian Free-tailed), how much they ate in one night (over half of their body weight in insects, but pregnant ones eat all of their body weight), and some weird facts (like some bats were discovered flying at 10,000 feet?).
She told us to give her a signal when we saw the bats beginning their exodus, a counter-clockwise circular motion with our index fingers pointed up to the sky because that’s the circular direction the bats would be flying out. It didn’t take long before we saw what looked like shadows making their way up and out.
Continued on 10-28-15.
The audience sat in silence, and it was refreshing to see a captive crowd with no electronics allowed. Although the bats were a little less than a foot long from wingtip to wingtip, they looked smaller than that. Even after we moved closer when some viewers had left, they looked about the size of an open greeting card. The numbers were incredible. It was hard to see the bats for the group. They moved so quickly that they looked like a singular tornado, not thousands of individual flying mammals. They would circle up and out of the large entrance and then a number of them would break off from that larger group and form a smaller group that would fly off to the right and then head towards the moon in the east.
The ranger said this exodus of bats could last anywhere from twenty minutes up to four hours. We stayed until we became too cold and uncomfortable from sitting on the rock benches, about a half hour or so, but we lost track of time. It was mesmerizing. My eyes wandered from the scenery to the bats to the crowd to the red-tailed hawk to the bats again. Belinda and I were certain that the hawk had success in capturing a bat after a few unsuccessful attempts. It stopped to chow down after one successful pass.
The cacti across the opening, with the setting sun shining on them, looked like groups of green grapes, but the cacti behind us, in the darkness, I mistook for the silhouettes of other viewers.
A bit more from 11-3-15.
Welcome to November. October was a fun, yet busy month. This month, we have our 25th anniversary to look forward to, even though we have already taken our celebration trip.
The second day at Carlsbad was just as wonderful and fascinating as our first evening there. We paid $5.00 each to enjoy the self-guided audio tour (well worth the money), and we walked all through that place, from the top to the bottom, and then all the way around The Big Room down below. I struggled with my camera to get pictures that were of the best quality I expected with all the darkness, but I managed to capture a few excellent shots. B took many photos with her iPhone, too. We had lunch (a shared turkey wrap and two chocolate chocolate chip cookies) from the shops at the very bottom near the elevators. Since it was a Monday, it was spooky quiet down there. Despite some other tourists, we could hear the humming of the refrigerators. It had the hint of a post-apocalyptic world, and we were the only survivors. A large part of the stores were blocked off with plastic wrap to increase the feeling of an isolated world.
During most of our tour, Belinda and I walked around with our mouths open. The beauty down there was unparalleled, the variety of the formations incredible! It was a bit much. When we were done, I felt exhausted by all of the visual stimulation. The audio tour added to the exhaustion due to all the information that we were taking in. Oh, and we did do a large amount of walking, too, although most of it was downhill.
Belinda and I were overwhelmed with happiness after visiting the Carlsbad Caverns. It’s an experience I know I will never forget, and it was so unique that it was well worth the trip way down south. It started two nights ago when we arrived after our visit with the children. The timing worked out so perfectly. We got to the Caverns just before dusk, the time when the bats come out of the main cave’s entrance. There was a time change issue, too, so we thought we were going to miss it, but after coming out of Texas, we gained back one hour, so we had plenty of time to not only see the bats as they made their exit, but listen to and learn from a knowledgeable park ranger moments before that.
The ranger stood at the bottom of the auditorium, where the seats were all made from stones. Belinda and I chose to stand up at the top, glad to have a break from sitting. Behind the ranger was...
the cavernous maw, the main entrance for both tourists and bats. She was an “edutainer” as she was full of info and extra tidbits of knowledge and anecdotes. For example, she explained what types of bats would be flying out (Brazilian Free-tailed), how much they ate in one night (over half of their body weight in insects, but pregnant ones eat all of their body weight), and some weird facts (like some bats were discovered flying at 10,000 feet?).
She told us to give her a signal when we saw the bats beginning their exodus, a counter-clockwise circular motion with our index fingers pointed up to the sky because that’s the circular direction the bats would be flying out. It didn’t take long before we saw what looked like shadows making their way up and out.
Continued on 10-28-15.
The audience sat in silence, and it was refreshing to see a captive crowd with no electronics allowed. Although the bats were a little less than a foot long from wingtip to wingtip, they looked smaller than that. Even after we moved closer when some viewers had left, they looked about the size of an open greeting card. The numbers were incredible. It was hard to see the bats for the group. They moved so quickly that they looked like a singular tornado, not thousands of individual flying mammals. They would circle up and out of the large entrance and then a number of them would break off from that larger group and form a smaller group that would fly off to the right and then head towards the moon in the east.
The ranger said this exodus of bats could last anywhere from twenty minutes up to four hours. We stayed until we became too cold and uncomfortable from sitting on the rock benches, about a half hour or so, but we lost track of time. It was mesmerizing. My eyes wandered from the scenery to the bats to the crowd to the red-tailed hawk to the bats again. Belinda and I were certain that the hawk had success in capturing a bat after a few unsuccessful attempts. It stopped to chow down after one successful pass.
The cacti across the opening, with the setting sun shining on them, looked like groups of green grapes, but the cacti behind us, in the darkness, I mistook for the silhouettes of other viewers.
A bit more from 11-3-15.
Welcome to November. October was a fun, yet busy month. This month, we have our 25th anniversary to look forward to, even though we have already taken our celebration trip.
The second day at Carlsbad was just as wonderful and fascinating as our first evening there. We paid $5.00 each to enjoy the self-guided audio tour (well worth the money), and we walked all through that place, from the top to the bottom, and then all the way around The Big Room down below. I struggled with my camera to get pictures that were of the best quality I expected with all the darkness, but I managed to capture a few excellent shots. B took many photos with her iPhone, too. We had lunch (a shared turkey wrap and two chocolate chocolate chip cookies) from the shops at the very bottom near the elevators. Since it was a Monday, it was spooky quiet down there. Despite some other tourists, we could hear the humming of the refrigerators. It had the hint of a post-apocalyptic world, and we were the only survivors. A large part of the stores were blocked off with plastic wrap to increase the feeling of an isolated world.
During most of our tour, Belinda and I walked around with our mouths open. The beauty down there was unparalleled, the variety of the formations incredible! It was a bit much. When we were done, I felt exhausted by all of the visual stimulation. The audio tour added to the exhaustion due to all the information that we were taking in. Oh, and we did do a large amount of walking, too, although most of it was downhill.
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