Caves and Zip Lines

This being our last day we wanted to do something to remember. We had planned to go to a zip line / horse back riding / go-kart place, but it turned out that I had misread the pricing and when I double checked in the morning it just looked prohibitively expensive. So when we were eating our complementary "hot breakfast" (read bagels and freezer waffles) at the motel in Cave City I found a coupon for another cave tour, zip line and rappelling spot up the road. So we packed up swim suits, filled the cooler with ice and headed out to the Hidden River Cave. It was on the way and we had a coupon so there was no stopping us.

We got to the place, parked and bought our tickets. Turned out it was about 1/4 the price of the other place we had originally intended to go so that was a bonus. (There were no horses or go-karts and the zip line was much shorter than the other, but it had a cave).

The cave tour was interesting. This cave had been used for commercial purposes and then wound up being sealed up because it became a sewer. After the region got a modern sewage treatment plant the cave cleaned up quick and they started giving tours again.
Caves and digital cameras again
                                           

After the cave tour we did the zip line and the rappelling. They were short, but sweet. Actually I think it was good that they were short. I'm old and he's young after all. The rappelling was just a little scary.

 Ready

set













GO!!!

Even wound ended up with clean pants at the end... Jasper too.  :)

And that was that... We piled into the car for what we thought was the home stretch, but then we saw the sign for the Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historical Park, so we stopped there and had one last bit of a tour before we really pointed ourselves back to the house. We had taken a tour of the Minnesota Capital Building earlier in the year and as Abraham Lincoln was the president when Minnesota became a state, he played an important role in a lot of the displays there so this was a nice tie in. They also had a Junior Ranger program so Jasper did that while I napped in the movie room in preparation for the long haul back home.

This is the monument to the birth place. 56 steps, one for each year of his life. Jasper double checked. 

This is the 'original' log cabin that AL was born in. Actually the forest service knows that it's not really the cabin. It did tour the country and was purchased AS the cabin, but after further research they decided that it was most likely an amalgam. It's a period cabin, not a re-manufacture, just not THE cabin.

Good times.

So that was it. By the time we'd finished here we were DONE.
We hit the road and headed for home.