Caves and Mines
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This cave is high above the valley, and has some cool pictographs. We spent too much time looking around and enjoying the view, so we got to hike out in the moonlight.
Known as the "secret cave", this cave is not really a secret, but it is very difficult to get to on foot. Timing is key - it can only be accessed at low tide. There are also some tough climbs on the way, it's definitely not accessible on foot to everyone.
Bears' Cave (Peștera Urșilor) is located the western Apuseni Mountains, on the outskirts of Chişcău village, Bihor County, northwestern Romania. It was discovered in 1975 by "Speodava", an amateur speleologist group.
Bears' Cave received its name after the 140 cave bear skeletons which were discovered on the site in 1983. The cave bear, also known as "Ursus Spelaeus", is a species of bear which became extinct during the Last Glacial Maximum, about 27,500 years ago.
In Japan there is a cave that was used by smugglers/pirates. They had created tunnels that connected to the cave so they could bring goods in without anyone seeing. Now those caves are all open to the public. They are not that big, but certainly worth a stop if you are in the Shirahama area, south of Wakayama.
In this image they had some lights in the cave that gave it that color, that's not a natural rock color, I hope you already knew that. I used a slower shutter speed to show some motion in the water, but not too much. I wanted to be able to see the waves still. Let me know what you think!
The Eben Ice Caves (also known at the Rock River Canyon Ice Caves) are located in the 4,000 acre Rock River Canyon Wilderness in the Hiawatha National Forest. They are about 20 miles southwest of Munising, Michigan, off of Highway M94
219a 1 - DSC_1441 - lr-ps
We have just got back from a trip to Iceland. It has been on my travel wish list for some time. The scenery is stunning. These are a few of my favourite photos.
A boat trip to Staffa promised so much: minke whales, dolphins, basking sharks, orca, sea eagles and Fingal's Cave, the famous inspiration for Mendelssohn's Hebrides Overture. There was the faint hope of seeing a few puffin stragglers too.
But the weather was against us. Not hugely rough, but enough waves and swell to prevent our skipper putting us ashore to explore Fingal's Cave. We saw plenty seals, gannets and cormorants but little else. No dolphins, whales or orca. But there were beautiful views of the Mull coastline and deserted Treshnish Isles. Scotland has over 900 islands, though the exact number can vary slightly depending on how you define an island (some small tidal islets may or may not be counted). Of these 90-100 are inhabited
Located on the small Hebridean island of Staffa, Fingal's Cave is one of the country's most spectacular natural wonders. Formed entirely out of enormous hexagonal basalt columns, this sea cave is the backdrop of a fascinating legend.
When you visit Staffa, you can’t fail but be awestruck by nature’s creative forces. Impossibly dramatic and romantic, Staffa is best known for its basalt columns and spectacular sea caves. The most famous of these is Fingal’s Cave, also known in Gaelic as An Uamh Binn or the Cave of Music, immortalised by Mendelssohn in his Hebrides Overture. This name reflects the cave's exceptional acoustics and the sounds created by the crashing waves within.
Staffa is a volcanic island and the basalt columns formed when a single lava flow cooled around 60 million years ago. As the molten rock solidified, it also shrank, allowing gaps to form, which created the hexagonal-shaped columns seen today, similar to those found at the Giant’s Causeway in Northern Ireland.
In addition to the cave, the columns form a dramatic cliff face which appears as colonnades or, as the Vikings saw them, the poles or staves (stafr in Old Norse) used in their buildings, hence the name Staffa. The columns are canted over at an angle of four degrees and it was this tilting that happened after they were formed, which allowed the sea to exploit natural fissures in the rock, hollowing out the cave over the millennia. Other caves on the island formed in a different way, when a softer layer of ash under the basalt columns was eroded by the sea.
Funnily enough, it wasn't Fingal who lived in this cave but his rival Scottish nemesis, Benandonner! Fionn MacCumhaill’s was a hero in Irish mythology and although a big lad, not a true giant. Separated by the Irish sea, however, Fingal felt brave enough to hurl insults over the sea to his rival, the giant Benandonner...
When the fight escalated, Fionn built the causeway across the sea to confront Benandonner. But when Fionn saw how enormous Benandonner was, he fled back to Ireland, destroying the causeway behind him. The remnants became the Giant’s Causeway and Fingal’s Cave, which is said to have been named after Fionn’s Scottish alias, Fingal, meaning ‘white stranger’.
It was the famous botanist, Joseph Banks, who, in 1772, first brought the feature to popular attention. Since then, a steady stream of visitors, including a list of famous names from the arts, have made a sort of pilgrimage to this ‘cathedral of the sea’.
Among those great artists was a young Felix Mendelssohn, who visited the cave in 1829. Duly inspired, Mendelssohn wrote the concert overture Die Hebriden, also known simply as Fingal’s Cave, which he finished in 1832. Coincidentally, JMW Turner’s painting “Staffa” was also first exhibited in the spring of the same year. Today, Mendelssohn on Mull, a Scottish chamber music festival, continues to draw inspiration from Staffa. The event brings together young musicians for a week of musical exploration and concerts inspired by the wild beauty of Staffa, Mull and Iona.
Calinawan Cave got its name from the word linaw, a Tagalog term for "clear". It is said that during the 15th to 18th centuries, opposing parties used to convene inside the cave to settle disputes, thus, the name Calinawan.
This cave also served as a shelter and a hideaway from the Japanese during World War II. It was also in this cave where Japanese soldiers surrendered to the Liberation Forces.
www.philtravelcenter.com/philippines/travelinfo/rizal-nat...
There are several sea caves and tunnels along the cliffs lining the shore in Bandon. This one sported some colorful lichen.
Fairy Cave is a huge natural cavern near Kuching in Malaysian Borneo. It's well known but seemingly seldom visited these days. The ceiling is covered in squeaking bats and the floor slippery with guano & condensation.
Though I could have walked further in, at the point I took this shot was where the natural light started to fade at the back of the cave.
This limestone cave carries an original native Indian name. Daylight enters in the two large chambers in the cave through a hole in the ceiling. The cave has a large population of bats. At dusk, the bats exit through the cave openings and roof-holes to forage and return to rest during the day.
Ok, I have some favorite things to see- waterfalls, caves, and paces where cool nature and man meet. So one a recent trip to Japan, I looked or all of these things. Oddly you don't see as many caves (or waterfalls) in Japan as you do in the US. This cave, Sandanbeki, is a bit of an odd duck. Caves can be untouched by man, or can have some light improvements, like lighting and sidewalks, and then you have caves like this. This cave quite the tourist attraction. Most of it was created by man, almost like a mine, but still very interesting nonetheless. There are now shrines in there, access to a real sea cave on the coast, loads of interpretive signs, and oh yeah, an elevator to get there. Hardly a natural wonder. Still, that means loads of cool photo opportunities.
This image is of a shrine location inside the cave. I knew I wanted the focus to be on the lanterns, but I wanted some environment too. So I went with a high perspective to highlight the unique lanterns. You see the lettering on the lanterns starting to peel? That's because they used to give stickers as tickets, to wear on your shirt. However, poor behavior ruins the fun for everyone. In this specific shrine, visitors would take the sticker off and stick to the lights, the posts, the statutes, just about everything. When they clen off the stickers, the lettering came off too. You can still see some of the old stickers that I guess they could not reach, on the beam above the lanterns. I won't go into a screed on who probably put the stickers there, but it probably was not anyone who was Japanese. If everyone just respected...hang on, no screed. I loved everything we saw on this trip far too much to want to leave any trace I was ever there. Take only pictures, right?
Guess what? They don't do the whole sticker-ticket thing anymore. Guess you live and learn.
[Explore • 2015-05-23]
Ancient cave dwellings used today in cheese ripening cellars Saint Nectaire.
www.auvergne-centrefrance.com/geotouring/curieux/mysteres...
Merci pour vos visites et vos commentaires.
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Gomantong Cave is located in the lower Kinabatangan area and the caves have become a major tourist attraction in Sabah. Gomantong is the largest limestone hill and the most important source of edible birds nets in Sabah.
The Cumberland Gap includes this gem, the Gap Cave. Many may know it by its older name Cudjo's Caverns. It was once Gap cave but was chanced to Cudjo's Caverns after a popular book came out that features a cave called Cudjos. The owners tried to capitalize on the popularity by changing the name. When the NPS took over the site they changed it back. It hard to believe the cave looks as good as it does inside when you learn the past. Loads of tourists through here at a time when preservation was not understood, and they held parties and even plays down there!
This is one of the larger features in the cave. It was a pain to shoot because you were on a tour, so you can't stop, there is no lighting, only these massive bright flashlights that EVERYONE has, and the tour guide is always in the way. Oh, and no tripods allowed. So this is the result of several images to exclude beams of light and hot spots, and people. Oh, and thank goodness for the new lightroom denoise feature. This was 10,000 ISO for goodness sake. Came out pretty good considering all that nonsense.
Let me know what you think.