A number of years ago when our boys were still kids my wife and I took them camping in Yosemite National Park and then worked our way up Highway 4 to Mark Twain country, Angels Camp in Calaveras County. Just outside of nearby Vallecito we discovered Moaning Caverns and spent a good portion of a day we will never forget for opposite reasons: Carolann and the kids had a blast, I was petrified.
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| Photo by Lisa Boulton |
It gets its name from the moaning sound made by water dripping into small holes at the bottom of the "chocolate waterfall" flowstone formation, which causes a drumming sound that echoes off the cave walls and is carried by the wind through the natural entrances to the cavern.
When you visit Moaning Caverns you can start outside with a flying adventure on zip lines created for the tourist trade, which you'll see at the beginning of this video. As you continue to watch, the video takes you on a tour deep into the bowels of California's Gold Country, a couple hundred feet below the surface, where intrepid tourist adventurers squeeze themselves through narrow paths and cracks in the rock to reach the grand cavern floor at the bottom.
Our family didn't do any rappelling, we just took the "easy" guided walking tour down hundreds of steps, but about halfway down my pounding heart and heaving lungs couldn't let me press on. I was in a full-blown claustrophobic panic and had to scramble my way to the surface while my wife and kids pointed and laughed as they continued their descent. Upon my exit from the hole I told the man selling the guided tours I just couldn't hack it. He was nice enough to give me a refund but when I said, "I guess this happens to a lot of people, huh?" He thought for a second, smiled nicely and replied, "No, not really."
Watch this and decide for yourself. Are you man or woman enough to explore Moaning Caverns?
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