Last Updated on June 6, 2019 by PowersToTravel
Thud! Thump! A woman cried out.
You could hear everyone gasping in the dark cave.
The guides rushed back to where someone had tripped on the rocks in the dark and crashed to the floor.
“Is she ok? Is she ok? Is she ok?” the echo rippled through the cave.
“Yes…. Yes…. Yes….” came back the answer.
It wasn’t me. I’m not the one who fell.
We were walking in the dark in a somewhat small cave, hard hats on, each couple sharing a flashlight.
“Don’t shine the light into the ceiling. Don’t disturb the bats”, we were instructed as we moved through the dark cave. That woman’s partner, while not flashing the light to the ceiling, was obviously not shining the light to her feet.
We walked through several chambers, and the Taino guides were descriptive of the bats, the stalactites and the petroglyphs. We emerged into a dimly lit chamber, as we approached the Ventana, the Window. The Window, as can be seen from the pictures, opened high above the river valley below. There were no protective railings, and the so recent memory of the clumsy woman was fresh in my mind. I worked to get good pictures and not get tooooooo close. The view was spectacular.
The Taino guide showed us details of the petroglyphs. He was clearly unlike the other Puerto Rican locals we had met, clearly a local from these mountains, and more closely linked by blood to the original inhabitants of Puerto Rico.
We stood for perhaps fifteen minutes getting the best pictures of both the Window and the petroglyphs. I could hear a child whining nearby, “This is booooorrrrrriiiiiing, can we go now?”
I thought it was great.
Diabetic Travel Tips
The walk down to the caves was via adequately maintained woodland paths. The scramble down into and out of Cueva Clara, the first cave, was not difficult, but required good working knees and adequate balance. The large open cave was quite impressive. The walk down into the Cueva Ventana, the second and even more impressive of the caves, also required good knees, but in this case there were high and uneven steps. The walk in the cave was on level ground and we required only the flashlight to identify rocks in our path. There was no food available for purchase, however the ticket booth (tent) is right next to a gas station where one could buy drinks or snacks.
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