Stalagtites, Stalagmites, Waterfalls and a Panic Attack

 What a thrill we had when we discovered that about an hour and a half from us was a cave system we would be able to explore!  We were about to drive to Cumberland Caverns.  Now, why does the sign say "Home of the Bluegrass Underground"?  Because this cave has one room in it that is so large, they actually hold concerts in it!

As a teenager I remember going to Mammoth Cave in Kentucky and thinking it was pretty amazing.  I thought the girls might enjoy it and for the most part I was right (don't you love to be right?).  Peanut and Sissy enjoyed it the most with Peanut being incredibly fascinated with it.  Sweet Baby liked it well enough but it was this day that we again learned something about our youngest (I'll share that later).

It was a pretty typical cave system with stalactites, stalagmites and all the cave formations that you see anywhere else.  Learning about how caves are formed as well as the various cave formations was an optional badge requirement for the Geology badge so the girls were checking off a few requirements for American Heritage Girls.

There were several places where we had to climb many stairs.  At one point we climbed pretty high and came to an area with benches where we could sit and take a rest.  In addition to just sitting for a few minutes there was a "light show" to watch, which was an audio presentation about the creation of the world and on occasion a light would shine on a part of the cave wall.  We learned that Sweet Baby does NOT like dark places.  She was sitting in between her dad and I when they turned off all the lights - you have NEVER seen dark like this before!  As the audio presentation continued Sweet Baby began breathing heavy and crying and saying, "I want to get out.  I don't want to be here."  I believe we witnessed her first panic attack!  Poor girl!

  

After enjoying the caves we headed back to Fairfield Glade.  We had checked the map and discovered that there was as state park not to far from Cumberland Caves that had a waterfall so we decided to stop there. I am SO glad we did.  We made our way to Fall Creek Falls (pretty original name huh?  I wonder if the person who made the swing at the tree house came up with that one.)

Even though it began sprinkling when we arrived, we were still able to enjoy the beauty of this park.  The road had us winding our way up the mountains.  Our first stop had us on the top of the mountain allowing us this beautiful view of the mountain tops and steam that was collecting at the top.

The only way this could be more beautiful would be into see it in the fall (my favorite season).  When we looked at this we could hear rushing water, turned to our right and were completely amazed to see this...

Now, I've seen waterfalls before.  Last year we took the kids to Taqhamanon Falls in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and I have been to Niagara Falls, but this...this was just amazing.  Here it sat - no crowds (we were the only ones there), no commercialism around it, with an amazing drop...it was awesome.

After enjoying the falls, we decided to take a little hike.  I'll share pictures of that in the next post.