On a cloudy grey day, the two youngest kids and I took a drive up the hill to the little town of Volcano.  However, before we got there we saw signs pointing to the Black Chasm Cavern, and we made a detour there.  

As things worked out, we ended up on the cave tour, and an adventure of a different kind.

Below is the entrance, just a big crack in the side of the hill leading down into the bowels of the earth.

The cave was narrow in spots, with just barely enough room for the stairs, but there were three large rooms the tour went through. The cavern was basically a large vertical crack that plunged downward, opening out into rooms periodically.

Whoa!  Don't lean out too far!  That patch of blue below is a pond of water.  In it live tiny transparent shrimp, no bigger than the size of a grain of rice.  Longer tours include a boat ride across to deeper galleries.

The fifteen year old checks out the stalactites.  Also living in the cave are tiny scorpions the size of your thumbnail, completely blind and transparent, and without stingers. They are unique to this cave system, and have only been seen three times since the 1800's.

Quite the way to spend a Sunday afternoon with the kids.  Already the teenagers want to come back and take the three hour adventure tour, which includes crawling, rappelling and underground boating.  I'll stay in the car, thank you.