Craters of the Moon National Park

After breaking camp on yet another 25 degree morning, we drove towards the west exit of Yellowstone and a nice hot breakfast, making a few stops along the way.  Less than four hours away from Yellowstone, but with something like 1/100 of the visitors, is the amazingly otherworldly Craters of the Moon National Park.  We peeled off our layers as we headed south and out of the mountains, and made our way back to the high desert and the sage brush, and then the lava rocks.

 

Craters of the Moon is a huge park – about the size of Rhode Island – comprised of the remnants of volcanoes from about 2000 years ago.  Since the scientists estimate that these volcanoes erupt roughly every 2000 years, it does make any stay a bit tense, but they held for another week and we had a great chance to explore the moon.  Or at least the same terrain that the original moon-landing astronauts practiced on before going to the moon, and which NASA even still uses to this day.

We spent Tuesday and Wednesday hiking and enjoying two peaceful nights’ sleep with mild temperatures, clear skies, and unlike our first two campgrounds of the trip, no train tracks running right along side them.  

I love looking at volcanic rock, and the way it reminds me of brownie batter swirling in the pan, but my favorite part is the flowers struggling to come up through the cracks. It was a long winter and a wet spring here, according to the rangers, so its not quite the high season for the flowers, but the ones that had bloomed were beautiful.  (For more volcano pictures, look back at the 2017 blog photos from the Big Island of Hawaii).

On Wednesday afternoon we explored the caves.  And I want to be sure to point out (because I want full credit when it comes to the Mother-of-the-Year judging, unless of course the judges are against such things) that these are not commercial caves, but wild caves.  Little ones, to be sure, but they all have signs in front of them that read (in bold): Wild Caves / Beware of Hazards / Unstable Footing / Falling Rocks / Low Ceilings / Dark Areas / Proceed with Caution Unfortunately, my camera died from lack of power to charge it up and don’t have any photographic proof.

We entered the first cave, Indian Tunnel, with a guide, one of the park rangers, and it was fairly accessible, with some stairs leading down to the bottom, and most of the roof being missing, so it wasn’t particularly dark.  Our tour ended on the cave floor, however, and naturally we were not going to be one of those families who simply took the stairs back up to the sidewalk.  No, we explored through the cave, clambered over rocks and squeezed through small openings to make our way back out and to the lava fields. After that we were on our own, and spent the next couple hours crawling, scrambling, and squeezing our way into 4 other caves, using our headlamps in the dark in cold (and sometimes snowy) hollows with ceilings too low to stand up straight.

We came back to civilization on Thursday with a drive down to Twin Falls, Idaho, some shopping, and a stop at beautiful Shoshone Falls.  When the water level is high, these falls are amazing, the “Niagara of the West”, but even low are still worth the $5 admission fee to the viewing area.   One motel night (where I don’t think any of us slept as well as we did while camping at Craters of the Moon, but at least we got to shower!) before a drive into rural Nevada (more snow-covered mountains, but we stayed a little below the snow) for a marathon on Saturday, and a chance to visit with several friends that we haven’t seen in awhile, some of them in a little more than six years.  

We’ll be driving and visiting for most of the next week, until another camping stop at a state park in Washington.  I’ll post again when we get some good pictures (and WiFi)!