#lechuguilla cave
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Lake Castrovalva area of Lechuguilla Cave in Carlsbad Caverns National Park, New Mexico. (Robbie Shone)
#archive#archiving#web archive#nature#cave#caves#lechuguilla cave#lechuguilla#lake castrovalva#carlsbad caverns#carlsbad caverns national park#carlsbad#new mexico#speleology#speleothem#speleothems#cave formations#dripstone#stalagmites#stalactites
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This Never Before Seen Aquamarine Pool Is Hiding Inside Lechuguilla Cave In New Mexico
"Just when you think you’ve seen everything, science unearths a new discovery that showcases the astounding beauty of our universe, whether here on our home planet or out in space. Recently, subterranean researchers made a humble yet fascinating discovery right here in New Mexico.
During an expedition deep into Lechuguilla Cave, a team of explorers came across this pristine, aquamarine pool. It was found in October 2019 but only made public last month. The pool, surrounded by cream and peach-colored minerals, is tiny in comparison to other cave water sources. However, the pastel color palette combined with the presence of human-free bacterial colonies makes this a stunning find."
isnt this cool! theyve made a new discovery in lechuguilla cave! lechuguilla is in carlsbad caverns nat'l park and is currently the 8th longest known cave in the world. it's closed to the public due to the presence of so many rare and fragile formations.
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Cave pearls of Lechuguilla
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sometimes a nature documentary episode can be so personal
#my favorite is planet earth’s episode on caves#the glow worm with a light that shines out of its backside !!! lechuguilla cave !!!#the dolly shot of the bat guano#rewatched last night in an effort to cheer myself up
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i fucking love. caves.
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Untouched cavern that developed its crystalline-like walls over tens of thousands of years, discovered in the Lechuguilla cave within Carlsbad Caverns National Park, New Mexico.
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[ID: Digital painting of a long, lizard-like dragon perched on a diagonal plane of snow-like crystals. The dragon has segmented patches of short spines that resemble white fur. Longer, clear spines line its back and branch from its head like antlers. Its curling white tongue tests the air on a black background. End ID]
Selenite crystals are a formation of gypsum (derived from the Greek "gypsos," meaning "plaster"). This picture was inspired by the formations in the Lechuguilla caves, which were created when sulfuric acid came into contact with limestone.
Available as a print!
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Tolkien asks: 4 and 9, please!
4) What passage in Tolkien's books or in any of the films/shows/media speaks to you the most?
It’s very difficult to pick one and say “this is the most”, but Faramir’s speech about power is one of the ones I love best.
“I would not take this thing, if it lay by the highway. Not were Minas Tirith falling in ruin and I alone could save her, so, using the weapon of the Dark Lord for her good and my glory. No, I do not wish for such triumphs, Frodo son of Drogo.
“For myself, I would see the White Tree in flower again in the courts of the kings, and the Silver Crown return, and Minas Tirith in peace: Minas Anor again as of old, full of light, high and fair, beautiful as a queen among other queens: not a mistress of many slaves, not even a kind mistress of willing slaves…I would have her loved for her memory, her ancientry, her beauty, and her present wisdom. Nor feared, save as men may fear the dignity of a man, old and wise.”
It’s an extraordinary speech: I would rather let my home and my country fall than use a weapon of evil to defend them. Because he knows that no good could come of using the weapons of evil, and it would only destroy what he sought to save. The second paragraph is a beautiful stand against both nationalism and imperialism - I want my country to contribute wonderful things, but I do not want her to be preeminent (“a queen among other queens”) or to rule over others by force even if that force seems to benevolent.
9) The place (and time) you would most like to visit in Arda? Why?
Nargothrond during the Siege of Angband. When people in LOTR remember the Elder Days in Middle-earth as times of beauty and wonder (“the workd was fair, the mountains tall, in Elder Days…”), this - as well as places east of Beleriand, like Khazad-dûm - is the time they are remembering. And it was a long time! Some 350 years from the completion of Nargothrond to the Dagor Bragollach, more than half of the First Age. I’d like to see one of the great kingdoms and craft-works of the First Age; Gondolin is too confining and Doriath doesn’t like humans, but Nargothrond is beautiful (and I think caves are very cool) - I imagine parts of it looking like Lechuguilla in the US Southwest, which is glimmering crustal formations like a fairyland - and Finrod is friendly and delightful and I would love the chance to meet him.
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10 National Parks To Avoid The Summer Crowds
From rugged hiking trails to pristine beaches, upgrade your summer at these under-the-radar wilderness areas.
— By Elizabeth Kwak-Hefferan | June 2, 2023
Two spelunkers explore Lechuguilla Cave—currently reserved for scientific research—in Carlsbad Caverns National Park, home to some of the deepest, largest, and most ornate caverns in the U.S. Photograph By Robbie Shone, National Geographic Image Collection
The most popular national parks in the U.S. such as Yellowstone and the Grand Canyon attracted record crowds last summer. For some, it might be worth fighting traffic or walking packed trails to see the towering granite monoliths in Yosemite or fireflies in Great Smoky Mountains. But, there are 63 national parks across the country, many with far fewer visitors—and just as many hikes with epic views, wildlife-spotting opportunities, and kid-friendly excursions.
Here are 10 of the country’s least trafficked parks, plus what to see and do in them.
Best Water Excursions: Channel Islands National Park, California
Hikers and kayakers find ample ways to explore this constellation of five wild islands off the coast of Santa Barbara. Beginner-friendly paddling trips, like the one from Scorpion Anchorage on Santa Cruz Island, let visitors take in abundant sea caves, kelp forests, and wildlife such as gray whales, dolphins, and sea lions. Strong currents and shifting weather make going with a guide a smart move.
Remote islands like Santa Rosa have hiking trails through rugged mountains with glimpses of wildlife, including tiny, endemic island foxes, at dawn and dusk. Spend the night at Santa Cruz Island’s only lodging option, Scorpion Canyon Campground, a half-mile hike from the beach.
Composed of five tectonically formed islands and surrounded by an extensive marine sanctuary, Channel Islands National Park offers dramatic sea views, epic wildlife watching, and scenic hikes. Photograph By Robert Schwemmer/Alamy Stock Photo
Voyageurs National Park, Minnesota
More than a third of this Northwoods network of boreal forests and rocky islands is covered by water—four huge lakes plus 26 smaller ones. New environmental protections make now an ideal time to experience these waterways via a tour boat, canoe, or kayak. Easy-access shoreline campsites line the park’s major lakes, but the wildest, quietest destinations sit deep in the interior of the Kabetogama Peninsula. Reserve a backcountry campsite along the Chain of Lakes or on the central peninsula’s waters, where your only companions for a spectacular aurora borealis show will be the loons and moose.
Best Wildlife Viewing: Kenai Fjords National Park, Alaska
This coast-meets-mountains reserve takes wildlife watching to the next level. Use the park’s only maintained long trail to the outlook over Harding Icefield for breathtaking panoramic views of this expansive, icy landscape. Along the way, keep an eye out for grizzlies, black bears, wolverines, lynx, wolves, and mountain goats. From a kayak or tour boat, look out for orcas, humpback whales, and dolphins among the waves and Steller sea lions and harbor seals on the beaches
Carlsbad Caverns National Park, New Mexico
Brazilian free-tailed bats are a star attraction at this Chihuahuan Desert park. Each year, these flying critters make their way back from their winter grounds in Mexico to roost in the park’s intricate network of limestone caves. August and September bring the best bat watching when the year’s babies take to the skies with their parents. Around sunset, the bats spiral out of the cavern’s Natural Entrance by the hundreds of thousands to eat insects.
Top: The glacial landscapes and coastal waters of Alaska’s Kenai Fjords National Park provide ideal conditions for viewing wildlife, like these Steller sea lions pictured. Photograph By Cagan Sekercioglu. Bottom: Thousands of bats spew out of a cave in Carlsbad Caverns in search of food. Photograph By Michael Nichols — National Geographic Image Collection
Best Hiking Trails: North Cascades National Park, Washington
Known as the “American Alps,” this park holds more than 400 miles of trails that take hikers and horseback riders to wildflower meadows, old-growth forests, glacier viewpoints, and remote lakes. One standout is the Desolation Peak Trail, which leads to a mountaintop lookout cabin where Jack Kerouac spent a summer. North Cascades remains well off the radar: Just over 30,000 people visited last year, a mere 2 percent of the traffic of its southern neighbor, Mount Rainier. The terrain is so remote and wild, the park is considering restoring grizzly bear populations here.
Mesa Verde National Park, Colorado
Explore the sunset-colored canyons that ancestral Pueblo people called home in Mesa Verde. Here, skillfully designed cliff dwellings, some with up to 150 rooms and large enough to house one hundred people, remain tucked into protected stone alcoves, just as they’ve been for 800 years. In summer, rangers lead hiking tours inside some of them, including Cliff Palace, the largest such village in North America, and Balcony House, which involves climbing up cliffside ladders and crawling through rock tunnels. After dark, look up. Mesa Verde’s skies are well-protected from light pollution, earning it International Dark Sky Park status in 2021.
Tourists visit the ruins of Cliff Palace in Mesa Verde National Park., Colorado.Photograph By Phil Schermeister, National Geographic Image Collection
Best Cultural Experiences: Dry Tortugas National Park, Florida
Accessible only by boat or seaplane, this park offers pristine beaches, exceptional snorkeling, and the chance to explore the historic Fort Jefferson. Located on Garden Key, the second largest of the park’s seven islands (70 miles from Key West), the military stronghold was the largest masonry fort in the Western Hemisphere during the mid-1800s. During the Civil War, it became one of the nation’s largest prisons.
Visitors who brave the two-plus-hour trip by boat or 40-minute ride by plane to get here can tour the grounds where Union prisoners (like the doctor who set John Wilkes Booth’s broken leg) were imprisoned during the Civil War. After strolling the grounds, explore Dry Tortugas’s other major attraction: superb snorkeling among coral reefs where you might see octopi, nurse sharks, reef squid, and barracudas.
Haleakalā National Park, Maui, Hawaii
More than 30 miles of trails wind over ancient lava flows and through endemic silversword patches before plunging into the summit crater of Haleakalā. Native Hawaiians consider the summit a sacred site, where they held religious ceremonies, studied the stars, and quarried basalt for centuries. On the other side of the park, visitors can still see their village ruins and fishing shrines at tropical Kipahula, an 800-year-old coastal settlement that’s now better known for its crashing waterfalls and the idyllic Seven Sacred Pools of ‘Ohe’o Gulch.
The famed Haleakalā Crater is a vast depression—but it's actually not a volcanic crater. It was formed as erosion ate away a ridgeline, joining two valleys in Haleakalā National Park. Photograph By Pete Ryan, National Geographic Image Collection
Top: To avoid crowds, visit Haleakalā summit after 3 p.m.; its sunsets can be as spectacular as its famous sunrises. Bottom: Erected in 1958, the Haleakalā Observatory is Hawaii’s first astronomical research planetarium. — Photographs By Babak Tafreshi, National Geographic Image Collection
Best For Family: Indiana Dunes National Park, Indiana
Kids will find more than just a day at the beach in this welcome pocket of nature amidst the nearby bustle of Chicago, a 45-minute drive away. An impressively diverse number of ecosystems in this compact park let families explore wetlands, oak savannas, pine forests, prairies, and 15 miles of sandy shoreline in a day.
There are also opportunities for kayaking the coast of Lake Michigan or canoeing the Little Calumet River (the park was upgraded from national lakeshore status in 2019). The in-progress Indigenous Cultural Trail features murals and interpretive signs that teach about the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi and the Miami Tribe of Oklahoma, two of the area’s original peoples.
Top: Mammoth Cave—Kentucky’s only national park—contains more than 400 miles of caves, making it the longest cave system in the world. Photograph By Phil Schermeister, National Geographic Image Collection Bottom: Park visitors stand up paddle board along the Grand Calumet River on the outskirts of Lake Michigan in Indiana Dunes National Park. Photograph By Keith Ladzinski, National Geographic Image Collection
Mammoth Cave National Park, Kentucky
Escape the summer heat by exploring a labyrinth of underground caverns that maintain a refreshing temperature of 54°F year-round. To see the caves, you’ll have to take a ranger-guided tour. These vary in difficulty, with options for families with young kids to enjoy the stunning stalagmites, stalactites, and tunnels. Or for the older kids, try the longer, more challenging tours by lantern light.
During the guided tours, park rangers point out remnants of early inhabitants’ mining activity dating back to 1200 B.C. and tell the stories of enslaved Black cave guides from the 1830s and the “Cave Wars” between rival tourism developers in the early 1900s.
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Lechuguilla Cave in Carlsbad Caverns National Park, the seventh longest cave in the world, with 216 km, New Mexico, USA
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In ur opinion what is the best cave out there
oh god theres so many to chose from i dont think i can say with certainty which is the BEST…. have i mentioned lechuguilla cave before? the formations in it are absolutely GORGEOUS. i really want to see mammoth cave aswell, its one of the largest in the world! theres also the xiaozhai tiankeng, the deepest sinkhole in the world. it has a rainforest inside of it, and rare animals like the clouded leopard have been seen there. its so cool.
the best cave that *ive* gone to is skyline caverns. ive been there quite a few times so i might be biased but its just so interesting to me :’)). i think ive talked a little bit about it before
#also whenever im talking about my favorite caves i HAVE to mention son doong#im a sucker for MASSIVE stuff and dear god it is MASSIVE#people talking to me#caves#caverns
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Lechuguilla Cave System
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Lechuguilla Cave in Carlsbad Caverns National Park, the seventh longest cave in the world, with 216 km, New Mexico, USA
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Lechuguilla Cave in Carlsbad Caverns National Park, the seventh longest cave in the world, with 216 km, New Mexico, USA
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Photo by Dave Bunnell of the Chandelier Ballroom in Lechuguilla Cave. These are the largest known gypsum stalactites in the world. Each is tipped with a spray of gypsum crystals.
Lechuguilla Cave is the eighth-longest explored cave in the world and the second deepest (1,604 feet or 489 meters) in the continental United States. It is most famous for its unusual geology, rare formations, and pristine condition.
Source: Wikipedia
#archive#archiving#web archive#found#found images#nature#cave#caves#speleology#speleothem#speleothems#stalactites#gypsum stalactites#chandelier ballroom#lechuguilla cave#gypsum crystals
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