Visiting the Camuy River Cave Park

Our excursion plan is to maximize our dollars and travel time while seeing as much of what there is to see as possible. Thus, ventures that are costly or that take a lot of time - those we're likely to do only one time - are saved for when either Dennis (Karen's husband) or Smith (my husband) are visiting.

A long-weekend visit by Dennis gave us the perfect opportunity for to visit the Camuy River Cave Park in northwestern Puerto Rico. This system of caves was carved out of limestone between one and two million years ago by the Camuy River, which is the third-largest underground river in the world. The main cave, and the only one open to visitors while we were there, is the Cueva Clara. Although the cave was likely explored by the Taíno people many hundreds of years ago, it was only 'discovered' in 1958. Since that time, more than 200 caves within the system have been mapped and experts believe that  there are at least 800 more yet to be explored.

Our cave tour started with a tram ride down, down, down from the visitor center. At the bottom, we entered the cave. The main chamber of the cave is 700 feet long and 215 feet high.

The view looking back and up from inside the mouth of the cave.

One of the interesting things we could see from the mouth of the cave was a tree growing upside down!

Once inside the cave, we got information from our guide and from the audio headset we each had that had a script linked to the numbered sections of the cave. The cave has lots of stalagmites and stalactites. Our guide gave us an easy way to remember which of these is which: stalagmites have a 'g' in them. This stands for the 'ground' and the fact that they grow up from the ground. Stalactites have a 'c' in them This stands for the 'ceiling' and the fact that they grow down from above and have to hold on 'tight'.

A gigantic stalagmite - about 30 ft X 35 ft X 45 ft -  is located in the cave. These amazing projections grow very very slowly - at a rate of approximately 1 cubic centimeter every 100 years. As our tour guide said, 'You do the math!'

Lava tubes, created during the formation of the cave, are another interesting feature. Depending on the flow of the lava, these may be in the form of lava cascades or lava draperies.

Lava tubes in the Cueva Clara.

Another interesting geologic feature is the cave witch.

The cave witch

Deep in the cave we came upon a spring with water pouring out of the wall. The water coming from this 'fountain of youth' is potable so we each had a drink.

Past the spring, we began climbing and noticed that the temperature was rising. That coupled with a musky smell let us know we were in the bat cave. The smell was from vast amounts of bat guano.

We saw huge crickets, a scorpion spider, and bats in the cave.

While we were disappointed that the 650 feet in diameter and 400 foot deep Tres Pueblos sinkhole wasn't open to visitors, we had a great visit. We saw a lot and learned a lot. And - ended the day with helado - local ice cream! We sampled all four flavors: coco (coconut), passion fruit, peanut, and corn (topped with cinnamon).