Trip Report
Scrambling - Mammoth Cave National Park
Three days exploring the unique geology and history of the world's longest cave system!
Travis Prescott
- Fri, May 16, 2025 — Sun, May 18, 2025
- Scramble and Explore Kentucky’s Mammoth Cave National Park
- Scrambling
- Successful
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- Road suitable for all vehicles
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- The walking tour routes are on a variety of surfaces ranging from hard packed dirt to paving stones to concrete. While generally level and easy to walk on, there are times where the hard-packed trail is somewhat steep and smooth. You'll want something with tread (not walking shoes).
- For the Wild Cave Tour, you are required to have over-the-ankle boots with at least 1/4" of tread. The rangers will check this! The passages here are much more rugged, involving travel on uneven ground, breakdown, and flowstone, which is often damp. While generally dry, some passage may be muddy. There's also a 42" chest/hips limit for the tour. The tightest crawl we did was allegedly 9" (though it could be bypassed) for about 5 feet.
While I had hoped to lead this trip last year as a Global Adventure, it wasn't meant to be, but this May my partner and I set off on an adventure to Mammoth Cave National Park in Kentucky — the world’s longest known cave system.
We flew into Nashville early on the 16th and picked up a rental car from Avis at the airport — a very smooth experience. Gas was refreshingly cheap in both Tennessee and Kentucky, hovering between $2.50 and $2.90 per gallon. From there, we made our way to Cave City, a town just outside the park that serves as the main hub for lodging and food. We stayed at the Days Inn on the 16th and 17th. It was basic but did the job and include a free breakfast. The night of the 18th we relocated closer to the airport, spending the night at the Element near the airport to catch our early morning return flight on Monday.
Cave Tours and Highlights
We booked three cave tours in advance through recreation.gov: Cleveland Avenue, Violet City Lantern, and the Wild Cave Tour — each offering a very different perspective of Mammoth Cave.
Cleveland Avenue Tour
This tour dives into one of the drier sections of the cave, with gypsum forming "snowballs" and "flowers" on the cave--a geologic oddity that makes Mammoth unique. The white crystal deposits glittered under the cave lights, and the path through Cleveland Avenue was spacious and comfortable — a great introduction to the dry geology of the system.
Violet City Lantern Tour
This one felt like stepping back in time. Lit only by kerosene lanterns, the tour winds through some of the oldest explored sections of the cave. The low light lent the whole experience a moody, atmospheric vibe — less ideal for photos, but unforgettable nonetheless. Along the way, we passed remnants of the 1800s saltpeter mine, the ruins of an early experimental tuberculosis hospital, and artifacts left by ancient peoples. If you are interested in the rich history of this cave, this is the tour for you!
Historic Tour
Originally scheduled for Saturday, our Wild Cave Tour was unexpectedly bumped due to an overbooking glitch. Fortunately, the park rangers were great — we volunteered to move to Sunday and were given complimentary tickets for the Historic Tour as an apology. I originally planned to skip this, thinking it would be too basic, but this is a must-see tour that goes through iconic locations like Fat Man's Misery, the Bottomless Pit (a misnomer), and Mammoth Dome.
Lost River Cave
We used the spare time Saturday to explore the surface trails and visit Lost River Cave in nearby Bowling Green. The prospect of a boat tour attracted us, but the boat tours had sadly been suspended due to flooding from recent thunderstorms. Instead we did a walking tour of the 1930s nightclub that was built into the mouth of the cave.
Wild Cave Tour
Sunday morning arrived and it was finally time for the Wild Cave Tour — the highlight of, indeed the ENTIRE PURPOSE of, the whole trip. This isn’t your average cave tour. You’re fully outfitted with a helmet, headlamp, gloves, coveralls, and kneepads (provided by the park — don't bother brining your own gear). The only thing you’re required to bring is a pair of hiking boots with ankle support and decent tread — and they will check them.
The tour itself was about six hours of crawling, squeezing, and scrambling through lesser-seen parts of the cave. It's not terribly strenuous but is not for the claustrophobic or those with a fear of heights. The guides choose the terrain based on the group dynamic and performance on earlier challenges, but we were able to do everything they are allowed to take us on, and it was equivalent to a T4 rock scramble at its most difficult.
The cherry on top was that for the final section of the tour, they turned on the lights (the ones used for regular tours) so we could admire the gorgeous dripstone and flowstone formations on our way out, including the incredible Frozen Niagara. These just wouldn't have been the same in a headlamp.
Final Thoughts
Mammoth Cave is unlike any other cave I’ve visited. It’s dry, massive, and packed with history — both geological and human. The variety of tours mean that there's a tour for everyone.
The only downside is that with over 400 miles of passages, tours are limited to about 10 of those, so it will forever remain a mystery to us mere mortals. I highly recommend a visit to any who are interested in caves or geology.