NPS Website; Local Website
WHAT IS IT?The third longest cave system in the world, second longest in the United States.
BEAUTY (8/10)
Jewel Cave’s walls are adorned with many ornate formations, particularly jewel-like crystals, which give it its name.
HISTORICAL INTEREST (3/10)
Most of Jewel Cave’s passageways are recent discoveries. We have Herb and Jan Conn, a couple who spent 21 years exploring and mapping the unknown underground, to thank for much of what we know about Jewel Cave. Jewel Cave was established as a National Monument in 1908 when much of its rooms and passageways were still undiscovered.
In the 1970s, Jewel Case nearly lost its standing as a National Monument. Luckily, the Conn’s and others were quickly learning that Jewel Cave was in fact much larger and more intricate than originally thought. As miles and miles of passageways and new rooms were unearthed, Jewel Cave gained the reputation as one of the world’s most extensive caves. Cavers believe there are still many more passages and caverns to be found.
CROWDS (4/10)
We arrived early in the morning. We watched the parking lot begin to fill as we waited for our tour to begin.
Our tour group was quite large and felt even larger in the small, cramped waiting area in the Visitor Center. One woman insisted on carrying her small child on her shoulders which made us incredibly uncomfortable for most of the tour since some passages are tight, ceilings can be low and rocks jut out at strange angles.
Our volunteer tour guide did as well as he could, but he would have been helped by an additional tour guide to steer the group. We spent most of our tour wishing the woman at the ticket counter had let us jump on the earlier tour of four or five people that hadn’t yet left as we were purchasing our tickets.
EASE OF USE/ACCESS (2/5)Jewel Cave NM is a long way from the Interstates, but not too far from better-known Black Hills tourist destinations. There are plenty of road signs that point you to South Dakota Route 16 from both Routes 385 and 85. Don’t expect to get there quickly. The cave tours are moderately strenuous, metal staircases await, and the paved walkways can get slippery. Be careful.
CONCESSIONS/BOOKSTORE (2/5)
The Park’s bookstore offered little, consisting only of two shelves that extended from the floor to chest height.
COSTS (2/5)
Three cave tours are offered: the $8 Scenic Tour, the $8 Historic Tour (done with lanterns). Ages 6-16 are charged $4 per tour. The adult-only Wild Cave spelunking tour costs $20, reservations are recommended.
RANGER/GUIDE TO TOURIST RATIO (2/5)
Most of the difficulties we encountered at Jewel Cave NM revolved around the lack of hired Rangers: 1) a volunteer cave tour ticket vendor refused to let us join the not-yet-begun 9:00am tour even though it was only 8:55am and the next tour was at 10:00; 2) the volunteer-run bookstore was inadequately stocked and in disarray; 3) no Rangers were available in the Visitor Center to answer questions; 4) our one college-aged volunteer cave tour guide had to handle a tour group so large that we needed to take three separate elevator trips (weight purposes) to return to the surface; 5) the Park video was unattended and as a result unseen.
The National Park Service has stocked Jewel Cave NM with a touch screen computer that aims to answer all your spelunking inquiries. The computer is helpful and its site-specific Ranger written explanations are noted by an enjoyably wacky sense of humor. Our visit would have been much better had we been able to encounter NPS Rangers corporeally instead of cybernetically.
TOURS/CLASSES (3/10)
At $8 per tour, we expected better.
FUN (5/10)The number of people and lack of space influenced the amount of fun we had. Waiting for the Scenic Tour to begin was tense. We were frustrated at having to wait an hour for no apparent reason and we kept scanning the swarms of people and trying to guess who would be in our group. Would we be with the thirty teenagers who arrived immediately after us? The family of ten? Those nice people at the bookstore? We wished there was more to occupy us as we waited. The bookstore is small. The video is supposedly on a continuous loop, but every time we peeked in, it was stuck on the introductory screen. Yes, the site is cool and you will see new and different things in Jewel Cave, but gosh, it was pretty stressful.
WOULD WE RECOMMEND? (4/10)
Jewel Cave does not offer much other than three limited cave tours. These tours can sell out quickly. All but one is first come, first served. No more than a few hours is necessary here. We spent the morning at the cave then headed to the town of Custer for lunch. The cave itself is impressive enough to warrant a drive from Wind Cave, Mount Rushmore, or any of the other nearby attractions. Jewel Cave would be a nice addition to a Black Hills vacation, just not the main draw.
TOTAL 35/80
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