Niagara Cave

This was another stop on our cross country drive. I admit that we only came this way because the Spam museum was closed and a family member suggested this instead. This was interesting. These are guided tours given at certain times so you need to wait for the next tour. They have a little gift shop to browse and a playground outside as well as a water thing similar to panning for gold and I think a mini golf area (we didn’t do this). The guide was great except if you are here and getting a geocache our guide didn’t know the names needed… hint… they are in the book about the cave located near the cash register. I didn’t buy the book, just snapped a photo of the page I needed so I would remember.
I thought this was a neat cave, quite extensive.
As always, I brought my own flashlight so I could look at things without the guides. There are lots of stairs in here so if that’s a challenge I wouldn’t suggest this one. The one big negative I would say is that we really felt very rushed through this tour. I had one child in a carrier and our other was walking/​being carried and it really was too fast for us.
Bring a jacket, it’s cold down there!

Super cool place. Stopped on a road trip to spend the night. Found this cave in the brochure at the front desk. Everyone who worked there was super nice and helpful.
Amazing gift shop with a huge selection and reasonably priced gifts for all ages. David was our tour guide. I am disabled and was not sure I could make the hour long tour that involves 250 stairs down and the same flight back up. David kept checking to make sure I was alright. The waterfall is sweet. And
at night they have lateen tours. Also a mini golf course and a food stand. Also a picnic area. It is only 48 degrees down there.

We were so happy we added this stop to our trip. My family enjoyed the cave and the interesting facts the tour guide gave us. The wishing well and waterfall were amazing! Also it was fun to look at the cool shapes in the cave each one with a story. It was cooler down there but with so much walking and stairs our kids didn’t complain (they were in shorts and t-​shirts). Make sure your kids use the washroom cause its a long tour if someone has to go. Of course there is a gift shop, we found cool patches to buy after the tour for our cub scouts. We skipped the mini golf but had $ 1 ice creams and we were back on the road.

We had such a fun time here! Tour guide was excellent and really made the cave so much more interesting for us!

Stopped here today on the way home from visiting family in Iowa. I gave it 3 stars to even things out as Scott suggested, and b/​c I don’t think its quite worth 4. =)
Scott’s description of the cave innards is really good. My kids and I thought it was a neat visit. It was about a mile walk and took around an hour. I certainly would not make the drive from the Twin Cities just to visit this place, but if you’re in the area its worth the admission price.
There is a little playground for kids and plenty of picnic benches and shade trees. We had a nice picnic outside. If your kids are into the panning for jewels, I would recommend buying one of the lower-​priced bags. We bought the Emerald, which is the most expensive at $ 11 and it def was sub par comparing with the dozens of others I’ve purchased at other caves and pumpkin patches (my daughter fancies herself quite the miner).

It’s one of those times you want to give a place three-​and-​half stars, but I decided to give these guys the benefit of the doubt. (so I guess the next person on the fence should give it three, to even it out. Heh).
Headed here because due to a state government shutdown, the nearby Mystery Cave was closed. The Niagara cave is so called because of the giant (60 foot?) waterfall that is INSIDE THE CAVE.
I’ve been to a number of publicly-​accessible caves over the years. Compared to those, Niagara is more interesting in some ways, less than others. It’s a very long cave; instead of a bunch of rooms, there are a few very large rooms, and then a lot of thin, but very high-​ceiling-​ed (up to 100 feet) passageways. Because of this, walking through Niagara cave often looks like walking through an Arizona slot canyon, which is extremely cool.
There are basically two large rooms at either end of the slot-​canyon like passages — the first one is the waterfall room, which is amazing. The second is at the far end, and is the room most full of traditional cave formations (stalactites, etc.). Other than that, this is a fairly young cave, so there are actually not a ton of those kind of formations around.
The staff at the site was very friendly, our tour guide was GREAT; a college kid who grew up in the area. The store up top has a nice shop, with both fancy mineral specimens and plenty of cheaper knick-​knacks. If you’ve got kids, they sell bags of mineral specimens in sand that you can then «pan» for outside in a neat water sluice running next to the shop. There is a nice green area outside, with picnic tables. I could easily see bringing a family here (and indeed, many people did).
So, in short: a solidly nice tourist destination, certainly worth the 11 bucks to get in (full adult price, kids and seniors cheaper); not one of the wonders of the world, but a good place for families.
And really, that waterfall is pretty freakin’ cool.