Entering Cathedral Caverns was like landing on a different planet. I’m clostrrphobic, but I felt secure venturing through the huge portal, measuring 126 feet wide and 25 feet high. Jay Gurley measured the height of the ceilings throughout the caverns by tying a tape measure to a helium baloon. He measured 80ft. He was only one foot off from today’s measurements. I’m guessing that he forgot to measure the balloon.
The property and caverns were purchased in 1952 by Mr. Jay Gurley for $4,000. Four thousand dollars to dodge the humid heat and retreat into 60° year round, wonderland weather! I want a day pass, not a one and a half mile round trip tour. When the time of trouble comes, I’m hiding in the cave, only a one hour, scenic drive away from me.
Two facts that astonished me were that Mr. Jay Gurley was not a trained scientist, but a photographer. I’m sure he freaked out when the flood waters trapped him in a tunnel for two days, but he was after the beauty created by the stalagmites, “you might trip”, and stalactites, “hold on tight”. Speleothems actually form because of water. Rainwater seeps through cracks in the rock. When discussing mineral formations in caves, we often talk about stalactites and stalagmites.
The second fact, the cave was not the threshold of an ancient burial chamber to meet the dead. Flint was taken from the walls of the caverns to make arrowheads by the Cherokee Indians during hunting expeditions and as a gathering place dating back to the Archaic period. However, archeological digs did uncover shark teeth lodged in the ceiling and animal bones.
The caverns exchanged hands a couple times before being purchased by the State of Alabama in 1987. It was opened as a State Park in the summer of 2000. Our tour guide told us that Alabama has the most caves in the world. When I return home, I’ll be digging holes.
Being a tour guide serves as an internship to becoming a park ranger. Tour guides are equivalent to miners on the moon, as Mr. Gurley and his friends chiseled, pounded, dynamited, and moved tons of rock and sand to craft the original trails inside the caverns, making it possible for people to see this natural wonder.
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