Ohio Caverns

On the morning of our fourth day of vacation we ventured Northwest of Columbus to where Ohio Caverns is situated. It is 4 miles west of a small town called West Liberty. I assure you it is long, windy, cool and our group of about 20 people took at least an hour to venture through here. There is time to take photographs during the tour but it is better if you have a professional camera or photographer with you to use them instead. I found that a lot of flash photography with regular digital cameras in the semi dark is definitely not good quality.

Our boys loved this cave experience and think it is a pretty cool thing to be 100 feet underground and see this rock formation in different colors. they have one stalactite and stalagmite formation that have joined together to form the shape of a water pump. Another humongous formation looks like a baseball bat and still other larger ones like pillars holding up buildings. The original owner of the land preserved these caves haphazardly until someone bought the land from him and then the next owner begun to stop visitors from touching the stalactites and stalagmites to prevent deterioration. I'm glad this happened as we probably would not have this natural wonder to enjoy if someone had not taken the care to preserve the natural history on this farm. Andy is above pictured next to a big icicle shaped stalactite.

We came out of the caverns at the end of our tour and had thoroughly cooled off with the temperature underground about 55 degrees Fahrenheit, to a whopping 95 degrees outside. It was a dramatic change! We picnicked on the grounds and there are shelters available to do that under too.

We later drove through the countryside on our way to an Amish restaurant (Family style) to partake of a late lunch early dinner in their buffet section. That was probably a mistake for two of us as the food did not entirely agree with us almost immediately. We are also not used to so many additives in what we eat. We will not be doing that for a while either. Photo above of the boys in the Amish wagon!

We drove slowly back to Columbus, OH for to tumble everyone into a bath as they were filthy from the caves. (Tip: wear old clothes) The fresh country air makes one weary too. So ended the fourth day of our mini-vacation.