Carlsbad Caverns National Park – Carlsbad, New Mexico

Explore the Attractions at Carlsbad Caverns National Park, New Mexico

Carlsbad Caverns National Park is one of the most impressive geologic formations in the United States, and it is certainly worthwhile making time to see on your visit to New Mexico. Carlsbad Caverns National Park contains 110 caves located beneath the surface of the Guadalupe Mountains.

The caves at the Park began to be formed between 4 and 6 million years ago at the Capitan Reef. In ancient times, the Guadalupe Mountains formed a portion of this Reef. Carlsbad Cavern is the most famous and popularly visited cave at the Park.

Visitors have several options when it comes to touring Carlsbad Caverns. There are both self-guided and ranger-led tours available. It is best to take some time to plan ahead which tours will be best for you given your physical condition, primary interests in the cave, and the amount of time you have to devote to a tour. If you plan to take a guided tour, be sure to make reservations ahead of time, either by phone or online through the NPS.gov Carlsbad Caverns National Park website.

You may wish to start exploring Carlsbad Cavern with your choice of self-guided tours. With the purchase of a general admission ticket, you can access two self-guided tour trails within the Cave. You can learn about the cave through trail signs posted along the tour routes, or opt for an audio guide for more in-depth information about the cave’s history, formation and geology.

Guided tours are available at a variety of different levels of difficulty. Some tours involve walking along paved trails, while others involve crawling through cave passages. You can find out more about guided tours when you phone ahead to make your reservations, or research information online.

In addition to touring the cave, another exciting attraction you may wish to see at Carlsbad Caverns National Park is the bat flight that occurs summer evenings. At dusk, 400,000 Mexican free-tail bats fly out of Carlsbad Cavern for their nightly insect hunt. Visitors can attend a program at the cavern entrance prior to the bats’ exit, and then view the bat flight. The best months for viewing the evening bat flights are July and August.

 You can also witness the bats’ return flight into the cave daily at pre-dawn. If you visit Carlsbad Caverns National Park in July, you may be able to attend the annual Bat Flight Breakfast held on a Saturday morning, usually in mid-July.  If you choose to attend this early morning event, be sure to have a local hotel set-up, which is easily found on HotelsCombined.com.

 In addition to touring the cave and viewing bats, hiking, backcountry camping and birding are some other activities available to visitors at Carlsbad Caverns National Park. Rattlesnake Springs is a unique desert wooded riparian area within the Park where birders have spotted more than 300 species of birds.

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