Last week my fellow covey blogger wrote about Gibraltar with beautiful photos of the area and the caves. Today I have pictures of Dunbar Cave in Clarksville, Tennessee. Tennessee has more caves than any other state. Caves and sinkholes are prevalent in areas with karst terrain.
Hundreds of years before the English settlers came to Tennessee the Native Americans lived in this cave. They left drawings on the cave walls. Symbols including circles, stars, and a supernatural male warrior figure. This cave is the only site in the United States where the public can see Mississippian cave art dating from about seven hundred years ago.
In 1790 Isaac Rowe Peterson claimed the land. He left the area to bring his family here to live. While he was gone Thomas Dunbar claimed it and settled his family there. When Peterson came back he sued for the land and won in 1792, although the cave kept Dunbar’s name. Today Dunbar is a 110 acre state park.
The cave is inhabited by rare animals, including the blind, unpigmented cavefish and crayfish, salamanders, and bats. The park above is oak-hickory forests and a small lake.. This is a place where one can see numerous wildflowers, songbirds and waterfowl, reptiles and amphibians, and mammals ranging from whitetail deer to raccoon and gray fox.
Visit Dunbar’s Facebook page,https://www.facebook.com/pages/Dunbar-Cave-State-Natural-Area/135480749813789.
Covey View 
There are wonderful sites and experiences right here in our own back yard! I will have to ask hubby if we can go there sometime. I still haven’t been to Ruby falls and I want to go there too.
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Where do you live. Are you going to write a post about where you live?
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I live in Dalton, Ga. I am really trying to like this area nature wise, but have to admit my heart is still linked to Virginia and the upper East coast. I will try and write something though. There are some nice things here like Prater’s Mill which has been around since before the Civil War.
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I understand how home plucks your heartstrings.
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You could compare & contrast the 2. It does a soul good to share.
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That’s true. Maybe I should do that. I need to download some more pictures from Va onto this computer. It is a newer one and I don’t have all of my pictures transferred. then I could do that. Thanks for the suggestion. 😀
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Sounds like a small paradise… Looks gorgeous as well. I think historic places tell so much about how we get to where we are, and this place seems to have an interesting history.
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Fascinating story, Meredith. Caves are interesting for the animals that live in them and the rock art would be good to see as well. Various places in Australia have caves, too. This gives me an idea for another post! In North Queensland we have the Undara Lava tubes which are a large cave system as well.
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I love how you tell the story of where you post for us. So very interesting and love the facts that you are so knowledgeable about.
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