The Second Highest Cave In North America, Featuring Three Exhilarating Rides, A Cave Tour, And More
Brothers George and John Pickett were out hiking in a canyon east of Manitou Springs, Colorado. This was in 1880. They heard something that was like the sound of blowing over a soda bottle. They followed the sound to two sinkholes and went down into one of them – they discovered a cave. The story goes the wind came and blew out their candle. It scared them so much they ran out of the cave.
A year later, George Schneider brought a picket and shovel to the cave and dug for three months. His hunch was correct – the cave was much more expansive then the Pickett’s saw. Schneider held his first tour for excited adventurers priced at $1. “There was a lot of crawling,” explains George Whitt, tour guide at Cave of the Winds.
Since that first tour in 1881, tourists have been coming up to Cave of the Winds, the second highest cave in North America, outside Colorado Springs, Colorado. The basic thrill of being in a dark cave is still available, as are many others that wouldn’t be recommended for the faint of heart.
Whitt explains, “We have three different cave tours as well as three rides – the ‘Bat-A-Pult’, the ‘Wind Walker’, and the ‘Terror Dactyl.’” The cave itself doesn’t have any native bats, expect for the occasional “Holiday Inn Express Bat,” chuckles Whitt, “a bat will come at night and leave in the morning and not return. Perhaps because of this, the park has designed the Bat-A-Pult to make up for it. The Bat-A-Pult is essentially a two-seated zipline with a twist. “It’s basically a chairlift on steroids,” explains Whitt, “It launches riders 400 feet at 35 mph. It stops, then reverses at the same speed back to the starting point.” The Wind Walker is a giant jungle gym, however it sits on the rim of Williams Canyon. It’s participants tethered, people are able to walk on beams and ladders with nothing beneath them other than the canyon floor 600 feet below.
The last ride is the most thrilling, so thrilling that “I would never ride it,” Whitt says. The Terror-Dactyl is the “first of its kind anywhere in the world” according to the website. Explaining it is something, riding it is a completely different experience. Riders are slowly tilted toward the valley floor. After they are facing the floor, the floor gives out from under them and they free fall over 150 feet and swing back and forth over the canyon.
Soaring Eagle Company out of Las Vegas built the Terror-Dactyl. “The guy’s crazy,” Whitt says, “he’s 80 years old and he was the first one to ride it.” Recently the Travel Channel did a video on the Terror-Dactyl. In one week, the video had 80 million views. The Saturday after it aired, there was an hour and a half wait to get on the ride; usually it is only about 10 minutes.
There are other activities that have to do with the cave – mainly tours. There is the discovery tour – a relatively conventional tour through the cave discovered in 1880. There is the lantern cave which is much like it sounds – a tour where one can’t see much because the way is light by lanterns and candles, much like it was in the early 20th century. The last tour is Caving 101. In this tour, visitors crawl, climb and move their way through the tighter spaces of the caverns. “You are guaranteed to get muddy on Caving 101,” Whitt says, “so we say to bring a change of clothes.”
As any place of mystery, there are a few ghost stories that are shared during tours. One, which is based on fact, is there was a mummy in the cave in the early 20th century. The mummy ended up missing at some point, which, of course, leads to some speculations. Another story is George Schneider’s second wife, Nelly, and him loved caves so they used to sleep in the cave. When Nelly died, it is said that she still stays in the cave because she loved it so much. “I have seen some weird photographs from tourists,” Whitt says, “it might just be the lighting, but you never know.” He also says that a former tour guide refused to do the lantern tour anymore after he heard strange sounds in the cave that he couldn’t explain.
With a place that has been around since 1880, there is plenty to do and explore. Although the theme is thrill at Cave of the Winds, there is plenty of subtle nature around that please all types of people. One cannot hear the wind blowing across the sinkholes anymore as the privately run park built a few buildings near the sinkholes, but there is still plenty of mystery, magic and intrigue to be had at the Cave of the Wind Park.
Andrew Malo
A graduate of Northeastern Illinois University in Education, Andrew has taught for the past decade in Chicago, New Mexico, and Japan. He enjoys tinkering with trucks and motorcycles, woodworking, reading and computer programming.
Make Sure To Stay At:
Mountaindale RV Resort, located in the beautiful Pike's Peak region of Colorado Springs, Colorado. Only 15-30 minutes from many beautiful area attractions and activities, but removed enough to enjoy the scenery and the abundant wildlife.