Cave: Nature and Culture (Earth)

Caves have been the sites of historical and fictional adventures for centuries. They are known for harboring dragons and treasure chests and for being dark, damp, and wonderfully unexplored. Despite their gloomy and cold nature however caves are often the homes of exotic flora and fauna, making an exploration all the more interesting to the eye. Caves are popular tourist destinations for their mystery from the lava tubes of Hawaii to the karst regions of China. To enter a cave is a thrilling experience, a mixture of fear and unabated curiosity. Some caves seem to go on forever, and others end in disappointment when one encounters a water-filled passage. Other times, the appeal is the sense that it has never been found before, until one stumbles across a discarded gum-wrapper. Ralph Crane and Lisa Fletcher investigate the history of caves, and their role in human imagination and experience of the natural world. They relate the stories of explorers who climbed and hiked to the best-hidden gems, as well as the adventurous cave-divers who went below sea level to swim through underwater caves. This colorful book, complete with beautiful illustrations of these wonders of natures, is suited to everyone from the general reader and cave-hunter to the ecological expert.