Marmot Adventures

Inner Space Cavern
by Stormy on June 30, 2005

Some discoveries are pure accidents. You don't know to look, but when you do, you stumble over some amazing stuff. Inner Space Cavern is a place that fits this description perfectly.

First thing in the morning I headed for Inner Space Cavern in Georgetown, not quite an hour north of Austin. Inner Space Cavern is conveniently located off Interstate-35 and has a very rich history starting in 1963 when a highway construction crew drilled out a core to install a highway support and were surprised to discover there was nothing down there. The opening was widened and a man was lowered in to look around. It was a cave! At the time the property was newly obtained from a rancher by the name of Laubach and the cave was called Laubach Cave. When the highway went in, shifted a little to avoid placing supports over the cave, the state took the cave over and developed it into a commercial enterprise, renaming it Inner Space Cavern. The cave does pass directly under Interstate-35. The cave is in 100 million year old Edwards limestone, but it's still a very active cave and most formations in it are still growing. There are sections where dirt fill blocks what should otherwise be going passage and exploration work to find more cave continues to this day. Inner Space Cavern isn't to most beautiful cave in the world, but it has some beautiful formations and is definitely worth a trip.

To get to the cave, you take a tram down a short steep incline. You can easily walk down, but for some reason a tramline was added to the cave.
(taken by Max on June 30, 2005)

The cave does not look like much when it starts out.
(taken by Jennifer on June 30, 2005)

There was a bat napping in the entry. It was probably a Mexican Free-Tailed male.
(taken by Max on June 30, 2005)

There are some very large sparkling flows in the cave.
(taken by Max on June 30, 2005)

There are also many pools of blue-green calcite saturated water.
(taken by Jennifer on June 30, 2005)

In places there are forests of formations too delicate to get to.
(taken by Max on June 30, 2005)

Could you possibly cram more variety in here?
(taken by Jennifer on June 30, 2005)

This is the original entrance into the cave. The original core sample was cut here at 6" wide and then widened to 2' in diameter to get an explorer in.
(taken by Max on June 30, 2005)

Lakes of crystal clear water fill the back of the commercial section of the cave.
(taken by Jennifer on June 30, 2005)

The electricians union refused to walk the length of the cave to do work in the back, so the state cut them another entrance and added a ladder.
(taken by Max on June 30, 2005)

Marmots aren't the only burrowing animals. These tunnels were made by shrimp, then filled in with mud that hardened. After the sand around the tunnels washed away, the mud representation of the tunnel network remained.
(taken by Max on June 30, 2005)

That's our tour guide. We wore the poor guy out.
(taken by Max on June 30, 2005)

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