Wind Cave National Park offers various cave adventures. One of the most memorable tour is the Candlelight Tour. Unlike other cave tours at Wind Cave National Park, the Candlelight tour takes you through the cave with just a metal bucket with a candle like light in it. There are no other light sources around you. This tour gives people a chance to experience what it was like to explore the caves back in the 19th century. However, there are only 2 Candlelight tours a day. 1 in the morning and 1 in the afternoon. Each tour can only take 10 tourists, thus it is usually difficult to book.
We got to Wind Cave National Park early this morning around 9AM for the Garden of Eden cave tour. Then we found out that there were spots available for Candlelight tour at 10:30AM, thus we decided to cancel the Garden of Eden tour and go to the Candlelight tour.
At 10:30AM, we got to the meet up place downstairs. The ranger came 5 minutes early to make sure everyone is wear closed toe shoes with long pants and sleeves. There was a woman who had to go change her shoes. Then the ranger took us around to go through the history of the Wind Cave by introducing the important people.
We then proceeded outside to the cabin beside the elevator. The ranger gave each of us a metal bucket with candlelight in it. The candlelight in the bucket was not a real candle. It was more like a light bulb that shines like a candle. Then we were asked to put on the gloves because we will need to hold onto the walls later.
Then we took the elevator to the lower level. In the beginning, we were still walking on the concrete path. Then we went through the gate into the darkness. The gate was left open to indicate that we were still in the dark cave.
Then path in the cave was not difficult to walk on. We were able to walk quite fast. Sometimes we do have to hold onto the cave wall to avoid falling. While walking through the cave, the ranger was also telling us various stories of Wind Cave back in the 19th century.
As we got to this large open room, the ranger asked everyone to turn off the light. It was pitch dark and it was so quiet. We could not see anything and could not hear anything. Then the ranger started telling stories about how a girl got lost in the cave and had to wait in the cave for 48 hours for the rescue. Of course we weren't afraid of darkness at this time because we had rangers with us. Imagine that we were alone in the cave, then we might have gone crazy.
On the way back, we had to walk a bit faster because we were behind the schedule. The ranger told us that if we didn't close the gate within 10 minutes of the supposed returning time, then a rescue team will be sent down to search for us.
Overall, we loved this 2 hour long Candlelight tour. It was an amazing experience we have not had before. We highly recommend the Candlelight tour when visiting Wind Cave. Make sure to arrive early and book the tour since it has limited spot!
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