Gadling

We've written about how you can mail a postcard in a cave, stay the night in a volcano cave--or some other caves, bungy jump in a cave, paddle in a cave, and go to church in a cave. There's a whole lot more you can do in a cave and I'm sure one of us have mentioned it, but these will do for now. Missouri is the place to go for even more cave fun. It's not called The Cave State for nothing.

The reason Missouri has such cave wealth has something to do with mining. When you dig sand, limestone and lead from underground, huge caverns are the result. These left behind caverns make for terrific underground recreation facilities since the temperature stays constant year round regardless of what the weather is doing above ground.

Here's what you can do in Missouri's caves besides walking through them. You can:

• play tennis at Underground Racquets Ltd. housed in a limestone cavern in Carthage.
• scuba dive at Bonne Terre Mine in Bonne Terre that used to be where lead ore was extracted,

And in the future, hopefully, you will be able to ice-skate and kayak at Crystal City Underground, once a sand mine.

Filed under: Climbing, Hiking, Learning, Paddling, Scuba Diving, Stories, United States, Hotels and Accommodations