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Lehman Caves (Great Basin National Park)

Photo: Famartin / CC BY-SA 4.0

Caves

Lehman Caves (Great Basin National Park)

Baker, NV · Great Basin$Park entry free; cave tours from $8 adults, $4 youth

About

Lehman Caves runs over 2 miles through marble at the base of Nevada's Snake Range, west of Baker. Every visitor needs a ranger tour ticket, babies included. Tours take 20 people at most, and summer weekends sell out. Book on Recreation.gov two to four weeks ahead, or be at the Lehman Caves Visitor Center desk when it opens, since walk-up tickets are often gone within the first hour. Wear a light jacket (it's about 52 degrees inside all year) and leave every bag in the car. The 90-minute Grand Palace tour reaches one of the cave's largest rooms, where many of the big formations have stopped growing and probably formed in a wetter climate, possibly during the Ice Ages.

Highlights

Over 300 shield formationsParachute Shield in the Grand Palace90-minute Grand Palace tourLongest cave in Nevada, over 2 milesAccessible 30-minute Gothic Palace tour

Getting there

100 Great Basin National Park, Baker, NV 89311

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America's Best Caves22 places

America's Best Caves

The Park Service runs eight of these 22 caves, and most of the rest are commercial show caves at $23 to $36 an adult. If you only pay for one, make it Ruby Falls: you ride an elevator 26 stories down inside Lookout Mountain and walk to a 145-foot waterfall.