Lehman Caves

Fantastic 90 min tour. The caves are not that big but pretty amazing.
Lots of stalagtites and stalagmites with cool formations. There are broccoli patterns and apparently more shields than any other cave in N America. If you don’t know what any of this means, don’t worry, the ranger will show you.
The tour takes you through about a dozen rooms. None of them large but all of them interesting. The ranger told stories of the geology but also of people who have used the caves in the past. See graffiti from ages ago and hear about the dances that took place in the 20s.
Great tour and if you are lucky you may even get a cave kiss.

Lehman caves tour is amazing experience, the tour guide was very friendly, and the whole tour is 90mins and only $ 10, I just can’t believe what I saw inside the caves, it’s amazing how Mother Nature can do! I highly recommend it! We drove from Vegas to Lehman caves was about 4 ½ hours, book the tour ahead of time so just in case they fully booked !! We took the 9 am tour, it was perfect during the week days because it wasn’t too many people !

Did the Grand Palace 90 min tour at 9am this morning and it was a steal for the $ 10 cost! The tours for the day were sold out because of the Astronomy Festival, so I would definitely recommend calling ahead and securing your tour with a res.
The cave itself is just gorgeous with some spectacular column formations and shields! This tour takes your through several portions of the cave, my fav being the inscription room where you can see smoke markings from early visitors, there was a penciled signature from 1906 and one heading out from 1902!
The formations are just incredible in this cave and you are able to stop and take pictures and inspect the formations (just remember not to touch them as this cave is stil active and growing). You can bring in a camera and a flashlight, but not anything else.
Our ranger guide was highly informative and I had fun assisting her by being the
«caboose» in our large group to make sure everyone stayed together and we kept the group moving to stay on time.
Highly recommend as this is a must see cave!

If you love caves, you’ll love this place! :D
My photos are from the summer of 2010 when I visited with my geology classmates. Hopefully not much has changed but it’s a really cool spot to check out in a tour with a park ranger.
Don’t forget to bring layers and a camera for all the neat rock formations :)

Ranger Steve led an intrepid group of 15 travelers into the depths of Lehman Caves this afternoon. What a treat we had. Ranger Steve is probably the best tour guide I’ve had over the years. He is knowledgable, personable and just an all around great guy to lead you through the eons of time and the discovery and subsequent development of Nevada’s Lehman’s Caves.

Fantastic National Park experience!!! Well worth the money to take the tour– loved the geology and history. Truly beautiful formations inside the cave, and we were blessed with an awesome ranger, Ranger Debbie (I think). She was great!

the grand palace tour was awesome it just kept going and going. very beautiful inside the cave things ive never seen in other caves before. ranger guide was very informative did not seem scripted.
one of the better cave tours ive been in
take the drive to the end of the wheeler peak just amazing

Great caves, beautiful hikes
The Lehman Caves tour was great. Sign up for the 1 ½ hour Grand Palace tour — it’s just a few more bucks, and you get to see everything. I suggest calling ahead for reservations for the morning tour.
Next, take the scenic 12 mile drive (30 minutes) to 10,000 feet, and spend the next couple of hours hiking to the bristlecone pines and the glacier. Take it slow — the trail climbs 1,200 feet, and you’re already a couple of miles up.
If you have time, do the 4 mile lake loop as well — it’s less busy, beautiful, and delightfully quiet.

Wonderful, clean, VERY quiet and out of the way national park. Hesitate to write about it because it might get busier.
We camped at 10k feet at the Wheeler Peak Campground, by a lovely little stream where the kids played — just magical. Hiked the next day to the Bristlecone Pine interpretive loop (strenuous for our 4 year old!) and had a snowball fight in June.
«Half the park is afer dark» — the Rangers are really great, knowledgeable folks with good ideas for families. They have received a grant for some great big telescopes, through which they show the night sky… first time I’d ever seen Saturn. Just magical.

I have been to 36 National Parks and this is a pretty good one. It’s one of the least visited national parks in the lower 48, partly due to its remoteness (5 hours from Las Vegas) and partly due to the National Parks competition around Vegas (Zion, Bryce Canyon, Grand Canyon, Death Valley are all within 4 hours).
We went in the winter so the scenic drive to the peak was closed. However, we were able to borrow some snowshoes from the staff at the Lehman Cave visitor center and go on a couple of great hikes.
Lehman cave itself offers a great walk-​thru with many different formations.

Lehman Caves is small, especially compared to the likes of Carlsbad Caverns, but the wild details throughout this cave system are well worth the visit.
At times, walking through the caves can feel like standing at the bottom of the ocean. Some formations look like steam vents and others like fossilized specimens. A few formations reminded me of the inside of a butcher shop. Children will see formations that make them feel like they are in the land of Dr. Seuss. This is a place to let your imagination run wild.
Take the 90-​minute tour, offered a few times a day, to see as much as possible. You aren’t permitted to bring a tripod so steady your hand then take as many photos as you can and hope for the best. The pace is slow so enjoy the ride.

Well worth the detour off 50, but make sure you have reservations or call ahead to see if there’s space; they can book up and they have limited tour sizes. Nice relief from the desert heat. The 90 minute tour is nice; you get to see a couple interesting rooms that are cut out of the 60 minute tour.
If you have mobility issues (trouble with stooping, uneven surface in poor lighting) this might not be for you. Also, there are a couple tight spots that a really large (wide) person might not clear. Obviously the claustrophobic should avoid the tour. You don’t have to crawl or do anything like that but if you can’t bend forward to clear 4 foot 8 for a dozen steps or so you’ll have trouble.
We had a nice picnic on the lawn in front of the caves before resuming our trip.
Also, the Caves visitor center is separate from the Great Basin visitor center.

A pleasant little cave.
If you are on a tour with anyone taking babies, though, I suggest waiting until the next one. Baby screaming is amplified tremendously inside, and it’s hard to hear the ranger describe what you’re seeing. Also, the cave «rooms» aren’t all that big, and a full diaper really adds depth and flavor to what you’re seeing. Not complaining, I’m not a hater or anything. I’m just sayin’…
They will turn the lights off and show you what it looked like back in the day, when all they had was a candle inside a can– a unique perspective, especially with all of us and our quartz halogen krypton LED flashlights.
All the rangers are pleasant, cheerful, and helpful.

We had read about the Lehman Caves and made a reservation ahead of time to take the Palace Tour. Words can not describe how breathtaking the natural formations are. Our ranger guide was informative and also had a nice sense of humor. We we able to take pictures in all the rooms, so hopefully when we download them we will be able to share these natural wonders with our family and friends. Going to see these caves is well worth your time.