Ohio Caverns

My brother John and I met at the Ohio Caverns in West Liberty, Ohio one day last week when neither of us worked. We actually met at a town north of the caverns, Bellefontaine, to have lunch. I had never been to the small town of Bellfountaine before. I was in small town territory in this delightfully rural region of the state. The area is about an hour and a half from Springboro. 

We met at a restaurant called Brewfountain- the name was kind of a cute play on the town’s name. The food was pretty good... if or when I were to find myself back in the town, I would likely try one of the other couple of other restaurants in it. 

After lunch, we drove down to West Liberty to the Ohio Caverns. The caverns are one of just a handful of caverns in the state of Ohio that are open to the public. The grounds (and underground!) are privately owned- the Ohio Caverns are not on state or city owned land.  The caverns are open year round except for on Thanksgiving and Christmas and tours operate continually throughout the day. The temperature is always 54 degrees inside the caverns.

I will let the pictures do most of the talking...

Rural route pretty-I took this picture of the surrounding land. This is near the entrance of the cavern. We were waiting for our tour to start. There were just six of us in the tour.

This is where the tour began. We would make our way down to the sidewalk area near the sign. Our guide started talking to us as we made our descent to the entrance. This entrance is only open from May 1st to September 30th.   I have been to the caverns twice before and both times were in December so I had only gone through the other entrance. My brother and I were at the caverns on September 30, so we went into this entrance. The tours themselves are slightly different as well, depending on whether you visit from October 1st to April 30th or May 1- September 30th. 

Approaching the entrance

The building that is visible near one of the trees is where we started. Our guide said that we walked close to a mile to get to the Cave´s entrance from the starting point.

I forget why I took this picture- I think the rock is limestone? And that´s why the guide pointed it out?

Inside the cave- the good news is that the formations get prettier the further you go into the cave :).

This is the largest (known, anyway) stalactite in Ohio

What goes down must come up! We had traveled pretty far underground (I forget the number of feet that we were underground) and needed to climb to get back up. Our tour guide said that the staircase we had to climb to leave had 60 steps to it! Here is a picture of it.

We came out of the ground near where the gift shop was and these solar panels. The information on the placard about solar power was quite interesting. 

Kids can ¨mine¨ for gemstones...

On the way out- such pretty views! I highly recommend visiting the Ohio Caverns if in the area or if up for a drive…Learning about the caverns and seeing the beauty and uniqueness of them was an enjoyable experience.  

Linking up with Joanne for Talking about it Tuesday...