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- EVAN ARCHILLA: Longhorn Cavern State Park is one of the
most unique places in the state of Texas.
We are the only publicly accessible cavern in the
state of Texas that was largely formed by the work
of an underground river.
We have literally centuries of Texas sized stories
that took place right here within the park
and largely within the cavern itself.
[wind noise]
I can think of really nowhere else in Texas where you can
walk in footsteps of Civil War era bat guano miners,
nuclear fallout shelter survivors,
underground dancers
and live entertainment from the 1930s.
All of it happening right here in Longhorn Cavern,
and you can learn all about it on a cavern walking tour
almost every single day of the year.
- MISTY SYNDER: Geologists believe that the rocks
that surround this cave are about 500 million years old,
but the cave itself is relatively young,
just a few million years old
and so we still have a lot of growing left to do here.
[playful music]
Watch your head you tall ones.
It does get low right here for a second.
So, I'm going to show you one of the bats
we have in our cave.
They're called tricolor bats.
They are the second smallest bat in North America,
and we call them the chicken nuggets of the cave
because a full-grown adult,
they are about the size of chicken nuggets.
- EVAN: We are one of the best places in Texas to be able to
get up close to bats and really admire these
interesting creatures at a distance and a level of depth
that you just don't get other places.
[crickets chirping]
- BRIAN JOHNSON: There's more to do here than just see the cave.
We have over a mile of walking trails,
plenty of green space,
picnic areas, lots of things to do here.
[hawk call]
- EVAN: Longhorn Cavern State Park opened Thanksgiving Day
of 1932, but in 1934 things really stated to change when
the Civilian Conservation Corp arrived to begin a formal
excavation and development of the park.
The CCC removed over 3,000 dump truck loads of debris.
- The CCC when they came into remove the debris,
all the work they did was all done by hand.
There was no machinery that was actually inside the cave.
They removed everything with uh, 50-gallon buckets,
five-gallon buckets, shovels, pickaxes.
They used levers up top to pull it out of the sink holes
that we have in the cave.
- EVAN: They installed our first lighting systems.
They laid down the first trail surfaces.
They built Park Road 4 uh, up above ground,
and they also built some of the beautiful CCC era buildings
that we have here on the property.
There's really a lot for visitors to take in
and the historical significance of what the CCC did here
is pretty amazing.
[dramatic music]
- MISTY: Anybody scared to go down there?
- CAVER: Uhhhhhhh.
- Longhorn Cavern offers a more adventurous tour, um,
called the wild cave tour.
You crawl around in the dirt.
It's not uncommon to get in the water.
You're crawling through uh, tunnels that are very low.
[smack]
Ow.
With the wild caver tour, you're crawling on your
hands and knees, army crawling on your bellies,
and all you have is one little light on your head.
I'll take you down a 3-hour adventure you'll never forget.
[wind blowing, water drips]
- EVAN: Longhorn Cavern State Park makes a great day trip.
If you're looking to come out into the hill country
to explore some of the diverse typographies
that we have in the hill country,
we're a natural stopping point on any hill country itinerary.
[dramatic music]