Friday, April 16, 2010

Caves and How They Attract Us



The first couple of times going to Disney (World and Land) we skipped the Tom Sawyer Island experience. I don't know why; I think it was a matter of there was simply too much else to do.

But our last trip to the World we decided to go for it. Partly this was because it was cold out and fast rides in the wind didn't appeal so much to us. Partly this was because even though it was in the middle of January, the park was really crowded. And partly it was because our boys are getting older and they wanted to try something they hadn't experienced before.

And the island was a revelation! It was tremendous fun discovering all the hidden passageways and the forts, the elevated walkways, the bridges, and the caves!

Caves! They just draw us. My wife loves caves, enough that she's ready to forego her aversion to long car trips to take a drive down to Kentucky somewhere in the undetermined future to see Mammoth Cave, and to consider a trip to South Dakota, where one can tour Jewel Cave and Wind Cave (in addition to seeing Mt. Rushmore and going into an old gold mine and seeing the Badlands and whatever else we could do). When we go to different places on vacation, we always stop and tour caves that might be in the area.

I've always been attracted to caves, since I was a little boy. There are lots of caves in Missouri and other midwestern states where we regularly vacationed in my youth. And we usually hit them all. Now it appears my boys have the same attraction; they love going into these holes and seeing all the formations, but mostly they love discovering what's around that next bend.

Tom Sawyer Island taps into this with the caves at both Disneyland and the Magic Kingdom. While I must say that I prefer the real thing to the man-made caves of the Island, I suspect that it's going to become a must-see for my boys now, at least for a few years.

2 comments:

David Landon said...

I've been to WDW almost 20 times, but I've only visited Tom Sawyer Island once. The caves are pretty cool, you're right. I wish I'd discovered them when I was a kid.

Scott said...

In one way they're cooler than real caves because in real caves you're sort of stuck to the path you're walking on...no discovery permitted! (But there's a "feel" to a real cave that just isn't mimicked - perhaps it can't be...)