Caverns of Sonora Job Offer

We were on our way to our new job at Colossal Cave Mountain Park when we got a call from the Caverns of Sonora.  It was Bill Sawyer on the phone, a life-long aficionado of caves.  I had sent out a flurry of applications just before our trip to Mexico.  I'd worked hard on them, and Bill said they were ready to hire us.  We couldn't believe we were almost to the cave when the offer came in.  We said we'd be right there.  In the above photo is a sample site in their hookup section of the cave campground.  We'd stayed here before, loved it, and did not want to leave...unless it was to get family to come see this special spot.
This was a paid position...besides being camp hosts, we'd get to give cave tours!  We soaked up information in their well-endowed "visitor's center", which had a massive collection of minerals, fossils, historical memorabilia and antiques.  Bill's photo albums of stunning cave speleothems at this site were unbelievable.  Nothing that fanciful could be real.  But we were soon in the warm and humid and living cave.  We found a meeting room.  You could be married or meet with the spirits or have a family reunion here....or maybe take a nap??








We found detectives were needed.  There's a $20,000 reward for the return of the signature feature of the cave...a gorgeous, but very fragile, "butterfly" (a bladed helictite).  Read this compelling article about the theft.  Bill told us they now know who did it and they intend to sue him for millions, but he has not been located.  He must be on the run, like the many wild-west robbers who used caves as their hideouts from the law.

We were distracted from our robber story by the deepening beauty as we descended with 4 other guests, who were true cave lovers.  Since the group was small, Bill said he'd take us to a wondrous part of the cave...that was even more delicate and beautiful, with a natural tunnel that hummed to a certain pitch and glorious white celestial rooms.  I was in helictite heaven, as I had done college papers on these gravity defying structures.  

Nothing prepared me for the Celestial Room...all decorated in White.

There was no end to the beauty!

I took my own movie and also bought one at the gift shop...but nothing captured the exquisite delicateness and perfection of God's own creativity with ordinary calcium carbonate.  This you have to experience yourself...on the small-group tour.

We were wishing we'd never heard of Colossal Cave, but we had made a commitment to be there and we had been told work had gone into preparing us a site with full hookups.  But we knew we'd found something so much better!!

 

We met with Gerry Ingham, a co-owner, and her daughter, along with Bill and learned even more of their passion for preserving and enhancing this invaluable geologic gem.  We wanted to be a part of this.  They'd even pay us more than the usual minimum wage, which was remarkable in this market with floods of hosting applicants.  The staff were all wonderful, and we knew we'd love working with them.  During our meeting an exasperated worker came in and said the plumbing was backed up in the restrooms.  We went out to the RV to talk this out.  We'd be working with wonderful people in a top-notch attraction...something you could dedicate yourself to.  There'd be a lot of interaction with eager-to-learn school children.  The job would be demanding...probably more than full time in a month or so.  But the big factor had to be we already had said "Yes" to what we thought must be a super job at a cave resort.

We decided to say Bye-Bye to the BEST job offer we've had so far...and farewell to the "singing cave".  (Play the above film clip to hear the cave humming...a natural feature that we'd never imagined even existed.)  Please visit this cave and see its wonders for yourself.  Anything on the internet does not let you experience what comes very near to being divine.