Oregon Caves National Monument

Caves have always held a special fascination for me, especially as I was growing up in central Texas.

In Texas we had the Longhorn Caverns and a deluxe tourist trap called "Wonder Cave" in San Marcos, Texas. We always joked that they called it that because you wondered why you paid the admission in the first place.

Not so with Oregon Caves National Monument. In 1874, while a local man named Elijah Davidson was hunting, his dog Bruno chased a bear into a cave. This discovery became an attraction, and in the 1890s developers opened the caves as a commercial enterprise. In 1909, at the urging of Joaquin Miller and other influential men, President William Howard Taft declared the caves a U.S. National Monument. The Monument was managed by the U.S. Forest Service until August 10, 1933 when jurisdiction was transferred to the National Park Service.

While you're there, you might want to consider staying here.