Florida Caverns
Florida Caverns
People have been coming to this spot for generations, using it for everything from a home to a hiding place.
As a relief from the hot Florida sun, the temperature drops at the entrance and cool air wraps around the body as a faint, orange light hits the eyes. It’s dark but inviting, strange but intriguing. Small puddles of water dot the floor, and the eyes dart across the dark surroundings.
Located in Florida Caverns State Park, the Florida Cavern Tour Cave is the only cave of its kind in Florida. The state park, three miles north of Marianna, has the only tour cave in Florida’s 159 state parks.
Rock formations that take names such as stalactites, stalagmites and flowstone look like icicles made of rock or even stone sculptures created by a world-renowned artist. Thousands of people come to the park each year to see the cave.
“They get to see a geological formation that’s absolutely amazing,” a park ranger says.
The caves began forming more than 38 million years ago, when the ocean submerged the southeastern coast of the United States. During this time, shells, coral and sediment filled the ocean floor. When seas levels fell, the materials hardened into limestone. In the past one million years, acidic groundwater dissolved portions of the material, creating passages large enough to walk through, resulting in more than 20 caves in the park, and the only cave in Florida opened for tours to visitors. The 1,300-acre park offers much more than the caves. Park visitors can enjoy picnicking, camping, fishing, canoeing, horseback riding and boating, plus the cave tours and nature trails. Even on a slow Sunday, the park features fishing along the Chipola River’s banks or sitting by Blue Hole park area.
One angler who visits the park on a weekly basis knows the lesson of patience is learned quickly.
“There’s something in here,” he said, sitting on his bucket full of bait. “You just have to get them.”
Elsewhere in the park, two couples peddled their bicycles across shaded paths surrounded by nature at its most quiet. They come to the park often on weekends for 30 to 45-minute bike rides because of the wildlife and natural views.
“When you’re riding, it’s almost like you’re the only one there,” one rider said. “It’s just nature.”
Hum
Humans have inhabited these natural surroundings for thousands of years. Native Americans once lived in the caves, and used them for gathering clay, temporary shelters and burials. Spanish explorers wrote about the caves while Civil War refugees and Seminole Indians hid in the dark crevices to avoid Union soldiers and Andrew Jackson’s army, respectively.
The park joined the Florida State Parks system in 1935, with members ofthe Civilian Conservation Corps completing most of the construction, including excavation of the tour cave. President Franklin Roosevelt designed the CCC, along with dozens of other programs, create jobs during the Depression. Many of Florida’s state parks were established at this time. The park became the seventh in Florida’s system.
Most people ask about the caverns or fishing in the Chipola River, rangers say. The river flows through the park, disappears 90-feet underground and resurfaces elsewhere. Before the early 1900’s, a half-mile natural land bridge existed where the river flowed into a sinkhole. Loggers used the land bridge as a way to transport cut timber downstream to a nearby sawmill. The river includes variety of fish such as bass, catfish, sunfish and mullet, among others.
The park and its land belong to the Great Florida Birding Trail, and is one of the most northern sites in the state. Visitors can spot birds more common further north, such as the winter wren, rusty blackbird, fox sparrow and dark-eyed junco. In spring and summer, the swallow-tailed and Mississippi kites and broad-winged hawks call the skies home.
The park was also home to a National Fish Hatchery during the 1930s and 1940s. However, the fish died and the ponds dried up. Work has begun to restore many of the 17 ponds on the site. The area looks desolate now, but park rangers say that once completed, the ponds will be similar to how they looked decades ago. The project included a volunteer day in 2006.
Park officials and volunteers organize the annual Florida Caverns Fall Festival, which occurs in November. The event includes reenactments of how people lived on the land hundreds of years ago. Many attendees come for the sugar cane, which is grown by park rangers throughout the year.
Florida Caverns State Park offers group and individual campsites, equestrian facilities and golfing at the Florida Caverns Golf Course. Guided tours of the Tour Cave are available daily, except for Tuesday & Wednesday, for a fee. The tour lasts about 45 minutes. The tours regularly sell out, with the last one departing at 4:30 p.m. Central Standard Time. Other caves in the park are open only for scientific research.
The Caverns - A visit offers tours through limestone caverns, miles of hiking trails through beech-magnolia forest and floodplain swamp bordering the Chipola River, swimming, fishing, canoeing, camping, and more than six miles of horseback riding trails.
The park is a 1300-acre natural experience with picnic, swimming and camping areas. Park visitors are able to enjoy the natural environment of Jackson County. The native flora includes the American Beech, Southern Magnolia, Spruce Pine, White Oak and Dogwoods. Wildflowers that abound are the Atamasco Lily, Lyre-Leaf Sage, Columbine, Mayapple, Yellow Leafcup and the Cardinal Flower. The abundant native fauna include beavers, alligators, Barbour's Map Turtles, and Alligator Snapping Turtles.
Location: Three miles north of Marianna on SR 167 (Cavern's Road.)
Contact: Park Manager Chris Hawthorne at (850) 482-9598.
