3 May 2026 - Mark Twain Cave

 

Today we traveled just 10 minutes or so from our campground to the Mark Twain Cave.  It is located just south of Hannibal next to the winery we visited yesterday.  The cave tours depart every hour on the hour and last about an hour, so we arrived in time to jump on the 1200 hrs tour. You enter the gift shop to purchase tickets and wait for the tour to begin.  

There were about 15 others on the same tour.  We all watched a short movie that talked about the history of the cave, and then we proceeded towards the main entrance, one of four known entrances. 

The main entrance

The cave was discovered in 1819 by Jack Simms and it was formerly known as Simms Cave, Panther Cave, and McDowell's Cave. It was renamed for author Mark Twain in 1880.  Above the main entrance we will use today is the Discovery Entrance.  We were told this was the entrance used by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) when he and his buddies played in the cave in the 1840s.  

In 1890 construction of a larger, more accessible entrance was completed.  We followed the guide into the main entrance and were immediately greeted with a cool 52 degrees Fahrenheit atmosphere which is constant year round. 

There are 250 passages in the cave, but we will tour just a portion of them today.  There are no stairs to climb so it is a relatively easy route, but it is not wheel chair accessible.  

Our guide did a great job narrating the tour, and the history of the cave as it relates to Mark Twain and his escapades as a child.  Tom Sawyer and Becky Thatcher become lost and escape through a small hole they find, which is separate from the main entrance.  Tom later returns to the cave with Huck Finn through the same hole they used to escape.  There is evidence of thousands of visitors inscribing their names and dates on the cave walls, including Jesse James in 1879, Samuel Clemens and many others.  

Some pictures of our tour:

One of the other entrances

The inside of the Discovery Entrance

We enjoyed the tour today.  It was not strenuous at all, logging just about 0.4 miles in length.  They said the cave lacks significant stalactites and stalagmites primarily due to a lack of active water seepage through its ceiling to form mineral deposits. 

After completing the cave tour we returned to the campground and later grilled some steaks with veggies and a little wine from our winery tasting yesterday!

Tomorrow, our last day here,  we travel south about 30 minutes to Bowling Green MO to have lunch with our high school classmate Monte Billman.  Monte and I played football together and he was a groomsman in our wedding.  We have not seen Monte since the late 70's!