Jewel Cave National Monument

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Jewel Cave NM NPS Website: https://www.nps.gov/jeca/index.htm

About Jewel Cave National Monument

Jewel Cave feels like the forgotten gem of the Black Hills, but let me explain. There are so many big ticket spots in such a compact area. Jewel Cave NM gets left off so many top 5 lists.

Check out my post on the Black Hills [here].

Luckily, a fellow camper recommended Jewel Cave National Monument as an alternative to Wind Cave National Park. After a quick bit of research, I was able to book a tour. Jewel Cave is only accessible through guided tour. Make sure to review the various options, and choose what is best for you and your travel buddies!

While I was traveling through the Black Hills of South Dakota, I intended to visit Wind Cave National Park. When I went to make a reservation for a cave tour, I found that the elevators were down for maintenance. Given this, tours were not running. I still visited Wind Cave and did a small hike. It wasn’t nearly the beautiful cave experience I was wanting.

The Scenic Tour

I ended up choosing the longer tour of what was offered. The Scenic Tour is an 80 minute ranger-led tour. This tour follows a 1/2 mile loop through several caves and passages. This was a somewhat strenuous hike, so be ready! The low light visibility and the 734 stairs up and down throughout the loop add to the physicality of the hike.

The group tour took an elevator down to the man made cave entrance. The natural cave entrance is quite small and is used my bats during particular seasons.

Prior to entering the caves, the group passed through a pressure sensitive door lock. After that, we all walked through a shallow tray of liquid (maybe hydrogen peroxide) to help prevent the tracking in of debris. The pathway we followed along the loop trail was a raised grate with a tray underneath. The trays serve as a catch all for hair, dirt, and debris that fall off clothing and shoes as folks tour the caves. These trays prevent the induction of foreign material, bacteria, and fungus into the cave environment.

The ranger stopped at several places to point out different cave formations that I could not begin to name. It was incredibly beautiful. We were asked to never touch the cave walls or formations. There are plenty of handrails if needed.

The best part of the tour was full darkness experience. In one of the larger rooms with a wide platform, the ranger asked everyone in the group to spread out along the handrail on the edges of the platform. Once everyone took hold, the ranger turned off the lights in the caves.

The group was encouraged to take a few moments of silence to listen to the cave and experience the darkness. I have never experienced darkness like that before. Usually, there is a small bit of light that your eyes can adjust to and allow for some level of sight. Without artificial lights in the caves, there was nothing. It was serene, scary, and wildly interesting. I could hear my breathe, my heartbeat, and the far off drips within the caves.

The loop ended where we began, and the group repeated the steps through the tray of liquid and into the pressure sensitive room to the elevators.

The ranger-led Scenic Tour was by far one of the best experiences I have had at a park within the national park system.

Quick Tips:

If you want to participate in a tour like this, I highly recommend booking in advance. The Saturday I went in August had all tour slots sell out a couple days in advance.

Remember, Jewel Cave is only accessible through guided tour.

The parking lot is small, but not unmanageable. There was a separate lot for trailers and RVs.

There is some hiking in the area, but not the primary activity. After my cave tour, I took a bit of time to do a small section of the Canyons Trail. This trail is accessed from the Jewel Cave Historic Area. You can find this area just another mile down the road from the visitor center.