Entering the Dragon

The entrance to the cave. Note that the dragon is
spewing mist while gripping a displaced chunk of
broken flowstone. 

One of the first places that caught our eye in the tourist brochure was Ryugashidou, touted as one of the longest and most famous caves in Japan, with a kilometer of caverns visitors can walk through. It is a bit far away, and we weren't sure if we could get there on the bus or not. The tourist info lady assured us there were two buses per hour, so we were game to try. We love bats, active geology and tourist traps. This appeared to have it all. And, delightfully, it didn't disappoint. Even better, since we hit it on a fall weekend before the leaves had changed, it wasn't too crowded, either.

Caves have always fascinated me. I've ventured into all sorts of commercial, tourist caves and even gotten to do some spelunking in wild, natural caverns. The commercial caves are interesting, but depressing because of the destruction ignorant cretins inflict - both the operators and the 'guests'. For most of us, though, it is the only chance we will get to see this underground world.

Bat girls and a few small stalactites and stalagmites 

Not sure if this inspires confidence or not. 

The 30 meter golden waterfall. It drops into a pretty impressive
pool at the bottom. 

Lots of areas were netted off to prevent vandalism. There were cameras, too.
It sure hasn't stopped anyone. Anything that could be touched or broken off, had been. 

Calcite ribbons on the ceiling

Flowing flowstone. This feature was called
 'Waterfall Climb of the Jellyfish"

This is still an active cave, very wet and drippy. 

This was taken in the Phoenix Hall, where we also saw bats
flying about. 

More calcite ribbons, my favorite feature.

broken off dead chunks of cave on display in the 'museum'. 

Fortifying ourselves for the 45 minute bus ride back with
green tea ice cream and some flavor that looked like,
but was not, cookies and cream. Learned
not to trust the white flavor with ground
 bits of something (the something was kind of burned or toasted.)
Only Jane got what she intended (strawberry) by picking
pink ice cream, of course.