Ways to explore
Caves & caverns
Show caves, caverns, lava tubes and underground tours. 213 picks across 136 destinations.
The best of the best
Luray & the Shenandoah ValleyLuray Caverns
The cathedral of the Shenandoah — the East's grandest show cave, dripping chandeliers over mirror pools, and the Great Stalacpipe Organ: the world's largest instrument, playing the mountain itself on electronically tapped stalactites.
San AntonioNatural Bridge Caverns
The largest show caverns in Texas, discovered by four college students in 1960 — an hour-long guided walk 180 feet underground past soda straws, flowstone and giant stalagmites, in 70-degree air that feels like a gift on a summer day.
ArubaArikok National Park and the Natural Pool
Aruba's wild side: a rugged national park of caves, cactus plains and limestone cliffs, ending at a sheltered rock pool by the sea.
BacalarCenote Azul
A deep, open-air cenote just outside the lagoon, with a cliff-edge restaurant and water that turns from turquoise to near black.
BarbadosHarrison's Cave
Barbados's showpiece underground — a living limestone cave with a stream, waterfalls and chandeliers of stalactites, toured by electric tram.
BelizeActun Tunichil Muknal (ATM Cave)
Belize's most dramatic cave trip: a jungle hike, river crossings, a swim into a Maya ceremonial cave and a scramble past pottery to the calcified skeleton known as the Crystal Maiden.
BermudaCrystal and Fantasy Caves
Two caves under Hamilton Parish where stalactites hang over still, clear underground pools.
Carlsbad Caverns & the Guadalupe MountainsCarlsbad Caverns
The Big Room — the hemisphere's largest cave chamber, a quarter-mile-wide cathedral 750 feet under the New Mexico desert, entered down the bat-flight mouth or by elevator, with summer's dusk bat exodus as the free encore.