Jul 21, 2009 15:51 - By: Joe Romano
Summer plans to visit my mother in-law allowed us our first ever visit to the lovely southern state of Tennessee.
Never having been to Tennessee I was sort of excited about the idea of visiting a new state. The boy did his 5th grade state report on Tennessee so we got to read a lot about the Civil War, the Chickasaw, and Choctaw Indian tribes, the Predators, the Grizzlies and the Titans (the boy was sorely disappointed to learn that Tennessee does not have a pro baseball team), Elvis Presley, Davy Crockett and Billy Ray Cyrus. But nowhere in our research did we come across anything about …The Lost Sea.
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May 22, 2009 14:04 - By: Tiffany Joyce
Kartchner Caverns Entrance
Kartchner Caverns State Park is located in Benson, Arizona. The “live” cave system was discovered in 1974, and extraordinary lengths have been achieved to preserve the fragile state of the cave’s environment.
Upon arriving at the park, visitors first enjoy a “Discovery Center” where they can peruse displays showing the different formations, minerals, and photographs of the original expeditions into the cave. A 15-minute video is played while people await their tour to begin. It describes how two intrepid amature spelunkers discovered an opening the size of a stretched-out coat hanger, wiggled their way along a shaft 200-feet long on their bellies, and discovered one of the most important series of caves in recent years.
This cave is “living”, meaning it still supports bats, and is still “wet” (limestone formations are still forming drop by drop). The explorers knew that once the word got out that the caves exist, they (the caves, that is, not the explorers) would be converged upon and killed in short order. So they, along with the Kartchner family (the landowners) appealed to the State government and made it into a State Park. They kept the modifications as subtle as possible to preserve the caves as they were when they were discovered. As it is, 85% of the cave network has never had a human foot upon it.
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