The billboards for Raccoon Mountain Caverns (which is just west of Chattanooga, TN) feature a cheery, smiling cartoon raccoon face and wording along the lines of "Camping! Go-karts! Gem Panning! Cave! Turn here for family fun!" It is not the first place you'd think of for a guided caving adventure. Somewhat to my surprise, they offer four wild cave expeditions of varying lengths. (Though the routes vary somewhat, the longer ones generally encompass the shorter ones.) They do also have a short walking tour, which I had done about fifteen years previously. This is a private cave, not part of a national or state park system, and one of the best wild tours I've done. The Gypsum Flower (AKA Gypsum Crawl) tour is the second longest (they don't let you on the longest if you haven't done this one) and is extremely challenging. Compared to the Mammoth Cave tour I took a few months prior, this tour had a lot more crawling and a lot more belly-crawling, and the crawls were more difficult: most in Mammoth were over fairly flat ground, but some of these were belly-crawls up and down hills, over ridges, and around corners. [Edit: This was after I had only done Mammoth Cave once. The Mammoth tour is so different from time to time that it can be an equally or more difficult crawling tour than this one!] Raccoon Mountain cavern is, of course, much smaller than Mammoth - Mammoth Cave is the world's largest with 400+ miles of mapped passageways as of 2014, while Raccoon Mountain had not quite 6 miles (though the southern end of the cave had passages not yet explored). The character of the passages seems different too, with Raccoon Mountain having fewer big rooms and broad passageways, and more small, twisty tunnels. There are also lots of fossils and some interesting wildlife; we saw three different species of salamander and a tiny spider unique to one corner of this particular cave. The first time I took this tour, we had just three people and all three of us were capable, relatively speedy cavers. We moved quickly through a lot of areas, having no particular trouble with crawls and squeezes, and because we were doing so well, our guide Kyle took us through several places he didn't usually bring groups. The second time, we weren't able to move nearly as fast and saw less. I am combining pictures from both tours, if you're wondering why the other people in the photos keep changing.
The neat-looking formation in the photo above can be slapped like bongos and produces deep, solemn notes. I'd suggest making a musical instrument out of it, but it's been done at Luray Caverns in Virginia.
After a short walk through the lit area of the cavern, we were off and crawling. We reached a fork and turned right, using a fixed rope to help climb a hill; our guide explained that we'd be taking a big loop and returning to this spot. Almost immediately, we did was the tour's longest belly-crawl, 180 feet under a very low ceiling, comparable in height for much of its length to No Name at Mammoth Cave. Here I am in the middle of the crawl somewhere:
Here's a slightly taller part of the crawl:
In the middle of the crawl, a shelf of rock hung down with just a hole in the middle, a tight point called the keystone. A room around this part of the tour was called Grand Junction and had about a dozen paths leading off. Even this smaller cave would be awfully easy to get lost in.
Most caves are wet on their lowest level, and unlike the colossal Mammoth Cave, we spent most of this tour at or near the bottom of Raccoon Mountain. A long passageway on the lowest level features an underground stream.
It was low since the weather had been dry, mostly two or three inches deep, but sometimes more.
We followed the stream for quite a while, occasionally detouring around a deep pool. Eventually, the stream passage became so tiny as to be impassable (also underwater), so we left it.
Squeezing through a passage near the stream:
I love the photo above and the one below for looking a bit like headshots. Pleasantly posed, nice smiles... but I don't suppose they'll get us any modeling jobs seeing as how we're filthy with mud.
This tour had quite a bit of canyoning. Here we are practicing in a safe spot before going to the deeper canyons.
And here we are traversing an actual canyon. It's not difficult, but you've got to pay attention! There's quite a drop. For some of the walk we had our feet on one side and our hands on the other, and in other spots, we straddled the canyon.
Taking a break over the canyon:
Another neat-looking passage, with some neatly-textured rocks:
Our guide took us through a series of three tough belly crawls - each twisting and winding through maze-like tunnels called Birth Canal. One ended at a tiny tunnel that most groups do not attempt called Natural Birth - a thin passage which you have to squeeze through on your side while trying to shuffle uphill. This is the entrance to Natural Birth:
...And here I am emerging from it:
Just like being born! ...If your mother's birth canal was made of rocks. And you were born full size. And if you could remember being born, which I have heard a few people claim. It was the tightest squeeze we had, and a tough spot to get through! Somewhere here in the middle of the tour, we sat and rested in the Echo Room, a big room which does indeed echo nicely.
One of the coolest parts of this tour was what our guide called a "canyon crawl"; a tunnel which looked like we were crawling into someone's ear, a canyon-like passage, but so small we had to crawl through it and take care not to get a shoe stuck in the gap. This is the canyon crawl's entrance:
Here I am in the middle of the canyon crawl:
Resting in the canyon crawl:
At the request of Mike and Clint, the other guys on the tour, our guide took us to a series of waterfall domes. The biggest was difficult to reach: a tiny hole on the ground, but five or six feet up in the wall of the waterfall room. Climbing in wasn't too tough - feet first - but coming out meant bracing on one knee while trying to get our upper halves through the hole high up in the wall. It had been dry in Chattanooga for months, so there were no waterfalls, just drips. (Though our guide did tell us that cheesy nearby Ruby Falls - a tourist cave with an underground waterfall - uses pumps to run its waterfall all the time!) Shortly thereafter, we were in another maze-like belly crawl squeezing through the second-tightest spot, which is called the 49 Cent Squeeze. Though awkward for tall people, at least this one was downhill. Starting into the 49 Cent Squeeze:
Here's someone partway through:
And here's a picture from the other side:
What doesn't really show in the pictures is that the squeeze is somewhat downhill and you have to squirm around a corner while your legs are still coming through the hole! It is a little tougher for tall people. I, at 6'2", was fine, but you wouldn't want to be much taller than that. (Why do they call it the 49 Cent Squeeze? Supposedly, if you have so much as 49 cents in your pocket, you won't fit through.) Around this time, we met back up with the stream and followed it for a bit. Come to think of it, the stream didn't have a name. Couldn't someone have thought of a name for it, like the Hansbach in Journey to the Center of the Earth? A big room called the Salamander Room has hundreds of salamanders in it when the weather is hot; this day in mid-October was not hot, but we saw two or three. The Sandpaper Slide must be a favorite of nearly everyone - this room has a natural playground slide that has somehow formed in one side. You slide down and land on a soft, flat (safe) floor.
That picture makes it look nearly vertical, but it's not as steep as it looks. Here is another sight which most groups do not see: a pair of narrow crawls through rooms full of formations.
At the end of the tour, after spending lots of time on our bellies, we look like this:
We can't have anything nice with you kids!
Though the Gypsum Crawl Tour is labeled as 6 hours (the others being 4 or 2 hours), my first tour saw more than most groups see and took only a little over 4 hours to do it. This cave was very muddy - nearly every part of our clothes was stained or caked with mud. We looked like a huge mess when we came out, and I recall our guide teasing some tourists: "We just came from the Crystal Palace tour. You guys ready for it?" The Crystal Palace tour is the name of the 15-minute walking tour that most people take. Ha! Raccoon Mountain' Gypsum Flower tour is a great adventure tour. It's highly recommended! In terms of difficulty, I'd say about a 9/10 on my first tour (with a strong group) and 7/10 the next time (weaker group). It's tough! You may want to try an easier one (either somewhere else or one of the shorter offerings here) if you're concerned with how you'll do.