Road Trip: Day Three

Cave City, KY to Nashville, TN

10.45am
After breakfast, ablutions, striking camp, that sort of thing, we went underground for a tour of the Mammoth Caves. As far as anyone knows, there have never been mammoth in or near the caves. Originally called Flat Caves after the original owner, they gained their current monicker when a visiting New Yorker forgot their name, and described them to a friend as “Mammoth holes in the ground,” which of course they are.

Ranger Jerry and Ranger Keith led us on the Grand Avenue tour which delves through four and a half of the park’s 350 miles of caves. Ranger Jerry’s family have lived in the Mammoth Cave area for generations. His grandfather was forced to leave his home when the government bought the entirety of the land above the caves and turned it into a national park. Jerry’s father, grandfather and great-uncle worked as guides in the caves. Ranger Keith is a recently-graduated geologist and an experienced caver. He’s the kind of guy who’ll tip his ranger hat and say “Yes, Ma’am.”

97% of the Mammoth caves are dry caves, without stalactites or stalagmites, so the attraction is not their beauty, but their size and the mind-boggling perspectives they throw up to the observer. We trekked through the bowels of a dried-up underground river, stopping to marvel at a large flat rock used as a concert stage by a famous opera singer, the underground cafe which served sandwiches and soup, gypsum formations that looked like flowers and others that looked like inverted snowballs. In a cave with a particularly good acoustic someone asked “Can anybody sing?”. A little grey-haired lady piped up with Amazing Grace, and about half the party joined in. For thirty seconds the cavern groaned with the sound of the Southern spiritual.

Shortly afterwards, Ranger Jerry brought us to a halt while Ranger Keith walked further up the cavern to the next light switch and plunged us into profound darkness. I was tempted to cackle a vampiric “mwah-ha-ha!” but to Courtney’s relief I refrained.

Finally, at the very end of the tour, Ranger Jerry informed us that Mammoth Caves did have some “flowstone.” A cavern known as Frozen Niagara was full of stalagtites. I was reminded briefly of Postonja caves in Slovenia, which I saw fifteen years ago.

15.10pm
We’re back on the road, heading for Nashville, Tennessee, which we hope will take just about an hour. We’re meeting Courtney’s old friends Catherine and Adam who got married while I was in the UK in June. In his email inviting us to stay with them Adam mentioned something about live music. I hope it’s not Billy Ray Cyrus at the Grand Ole Opry!

16.57pm

We cross the border into Tennessee, where the speed limit of 65 is superceded by a heady 70. Americans break the speed limit as often as Brits, but normally not by as much.

17.17pm
Comedy business of the day: Hardee’s Thickburgers of Goodlettsville, TN. Yes, a double thickburger with supersized fatfries and gloopshake, please!

17.40pm
Stuck in traffic in Nashville, I see a car with an Alabama licence plate which bears the motto “Stars fell on Alabama.” I want to go there and look for meteor craters now. Nashville is grey and rainy. Courtney phones Adam to tell him we’ll be a little late. He tells us to be as quick as we can because we’re going to see "Weird Al" Yankovic tonight. Rad!

Today’s mileage: 107m (+4.5 miles underground)

Comedy business of the day is actually a comedy product, Deja Blue: it’s water in a blue bottle! I feel like I’ve drunk it before, many times, and I probably have.