Today we joined some friends and toured Mitchell Caverns and the Mojave National Preserve a little east of Needles California. Ed and Sarah are good friends from Portland Oregon. They have traveled to the area to visit Ed’s sister Jo, for Thanksgiving and they all came to Needles to meet with us and do a little spelunking. We drove up onto the Providence Mountains in time to catch the 10 am tour through the Tecopa and El Pakiva caves.

The tour is an hour and a half long and you walk about a mile. The groups are limited to 25. The caves are beautiful in themselves, but we are biased and think the Oregon Caves are better. Access is easy and the caves have concrete walkways throughout. Entrance fee is only $6 and it is only about 20 miles off I-40. I think we could have gotten Arcturus turned around in there, but you would be more comfortable arriving in you car.

After our spelunking adventure we drove around the corner to the Hole-In-The-Wall visitor center at the Mojave National Preserve. We found there was a mile or so hike that promised some petroglyphs and a climb up the ring loop trail in Banshee Canyon. The canyon itself has towering rock walls that make you feel like an ant. The walls are pock-marked with holes dimpling the surfaces. As you work your way into the blind canyon the walls draw closer and closer until the path becomes a slot canyon and begins to climb sharply. This then becomes a chute carved by the water and is barely wide enough to climb through. In three sections it is so steep and shear that they have drilled in pitons with large rings to haul yourself vertically up through the slot. You must go to the website and see the photos.  One of the photos shows Judy and Ed climbing the rings straight up the chute.

Hole-In-The-Wall has a no frills campground and would make a fine base of operations to visit the area.

After this adventure we were ready for a big meal and a good sleep. Tomorrow we will go east into Arizona and visit Lake Havasu City and London Bridge together.

After peeking at the weather our friends back in the Pacific Northwest are dealing with I am almost hesitant to mention that we enjoyed a day of 65 degrees inside the cavern and out. There was much more sun outside the cavern, however. Just another (ho-hum) perfect day in paradise.

We close with greeting from sunny downtown Needles, California.

Gary and Judy with Ed, Sarah and Jo.