Usually the ladies and I would head to the beach for the holidays, but the weather wasn’t cooperating. So we headed underground, making a day trip to Luray Caverns in the Shenandoah Mountains.
On the lawn there’s a construction of the word LOVE made of wood. Nothing quite as world renowned as the one in Philadelphia, but quite popular as everyone was taking pictures with it.
We got there sometime after 2 or 3 in the afternoon. Mistake. The line was so long that if we didn’t drive a couple of hours to get there, we would’ve left. I was okay with heading back and stopping by Skyline Caverns, another cavern we saw on the way to Luray.
But, Nduku volunteered to stand in line, which took close to an hour to get to the door, while I took Najwa to the Toy Store. There was a huge train display with a miniature city. There were sections broken up in decades of the popular toys at that time. Anyone remember the Cabbage Patch dolls?
Luckily they had a small play area with wooden train cars and a track to keep Najwa preoccupied while we waited.
But we made it to the caverns. There really isn’t much you can say about them. You just have to visit and experience it yourself. It was discovered in 1878 but were formed [or started its forming] 4 million years ago.
There are a number of formations in the rocks with cool names, cool histories and cool myths/stories to go along with them, but the place was crowded and Najwa wasn’t one to sit still listening to the tour guides explaining everything. Some of the photos I are of some of those places. They have names such as Totem Poles, Tatiana’s Veil, Pluto’s Chasm, Saracen’s Tent and so forth.
If no one would’ve said anything, I would’ve walked right past this one. “Dream Lake” is Luray Caverns’ largest body of water, but it’s no more than 18 to 20 inches deep. But it’s not the shallowness that hides it, it’s the perfectly still water creating a mirror image of the stalactites hanging from the ceiling.
At the end of the trail, there’s an organ, but not one you’re likely to find in a church. This one is made out of stalactites.
The Great Stalacpipe Organ is an electrically actuated lithophone located in Luray Caverns. It is operated by a custom console that produces the tapping of ancient stalactites of varying sizes with solenoid-actuated rubber mallets in order to produce tones. The instrument’s name was derived from the resemblance of the selected 37 naturally formed stalactites to the pipework of a traditional pipe organ along with its custom organ-style keyboard console. It was designed and implemented in 1956 over three years by Leland W. Sprinkle inside the Luray Caverns.
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