Carlsbad Caverns National Park

New Mexico | October 2026

Each evening from late spring through October, somewhere between 400,000 and 500,000 Mexican free-tailed bats spiral out of the natural entrance to Carlsbad Cavern in a counter-clockwise column that can take up to three hours to complete. People gather at dusk at an outdoor amphitheater to watch. There is no narration, no soundtrack. Just the sound of wings, and the smell of the cave on the night air, and the sky turning dark as the bats pour out by the hundreds of thousands. It is one of the most extraordinary natural events in North America and it happens every single evening all summer long.

Carlsbad Caverns National Park protects more than 119 known caves within the Guadalupe Mountains of southeastern New Mexico. The park sits within what was once a massive inland sea, and the limestone that makes up its caves is the fossilized remains of a Permian reef built primarily by sponges and algae over 265 million years ago. What makes the formation of Carlsbad Caverns unusual, and geologically rare, is that it was not carved by slightly acidic rainwater working downward from the surface, as most cave systems are. Instead, it was dissolved from below by sulfuric acid rising up through fractures in the rock from natural oil and gas deposits beneath. This process produced chambers of exceptional size. The Big Room alone covers more than 350,000 square feet with a ceiling that reaches 255 feet at its highest point. It is one of the largest underground chambers in North America.

A young cowboy named Jim White first explored the cave seriously in the late 1890s, descending alone with a kerosene lantern after watching what he thought was smoke rising from the desert floor, which turned out to be the bat flight. He spent years mapping and naming the rooms he found: the King's Palace, the Queen's Chamber, the Papoose Room, the Green Lake Room. The cave became a National Monument in 1923, a National Park in 1930, and a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1995.

Inside, the temperature stays a constant 56 degrees Fahrenheit year-round regardless of the heat on the surface. The formations have been growing continuously for millions of years. Some of the most delicate are the soda straws, hollow tubes of calcite hanging from the ceiling, each one no thicker than a drinking straw, built drop by drop over centuries.

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