Great Basin national park in east-central Nevada near the Utah border is a relatively new member (established in 1986) of the national park system. Named for its unique hydrology as a collection bowl that only drains internally: i.e., water flows into the Great Basin, pools briefly, then drains through the crust or evaporates, with no flow leaving the basin.




But, Lehman cave was what we came to this park to see. The cave was discovered in the 1880s, was privately owned for a while, made into a national monument in 1922, and then incorporated into the much larger national park. Some of the most unique of all cave formations are found in abundance here —
“Lehman Caves has such familiar cave formations as stalactites, stalagmites, columns, draperies, flowstone and soda straws. There are also some rarities such as shields, which consist of two roughly circular plates fastened together like fattened clam shells, often with graceful stalactites and draperies hanging from their lower plate. Lehman Caves is most famous for its abundance of shields. A shield called the Parachute and other formations make touring Lehman Caves an unusual and rewarding experience. Delicate helictites, small branching formations that defy gravity, and anthodites, small needle-like crystals of aragonite, are also found throughout the caves. Cave popcorn resembling the edible variety, adorns many walls.” (https://www.desertusa.com/grb/lehman.html)





No flash photography is allowed in the cave, but the formations are well lit so that a camera phone can capture their beauty. Passageways are very narrow, with delicate formations right in the middle of the path that we had to carefully walk around without touching. The formations are wet, and water drips continuously from the ceiling, so the path is slippery in some places. Needless to say, our visit here was one of the highlights of the “road trip-2022”.
And next it’s on to the dinosaurs of Utah!