Carlsbad Caverns King's Palace Tour: What to Expect

Carlsbad Caverns National Park in New Mexico has some of the largest caves in North America. Over 100 and still counting limestone caves and passageways can be found here. At this time, there are only two sections that are open to the public, the Big Room and King’s Palace. The Big Room is the only one that you can visit on your own. For King’s Palace, you will need to join a Ranger Tour. King’s Palace Tour at Carlsbad Caverns is a 1.5-hour ranger-guided tour that would take you 830ft underground, through 4 chambers full of beautiful and interesting cave formations. If you’re visiting Carlsbad Caverns, you need to do this!

Video

Tips and Important Info for King’s Palace Tour at Carlsbad Caverns

How Long is the Tour?

The tour is 1.5 hours and you will have to walk for 1 mile through the four chambers. The trail is paved with some steep descending and ascending.

How Much Does It Cost?

At this time, The King’s Palace Tour costs $8/adult and $4/child. Besides the King’s Palace Tour ticket, you will also need the general admission ticket which is $1 as well as the park entrance fee ($15/person). The $1 general admission ticket will allow you to access the awesome Big Room before and after your King’s Palace Tour. The park entrance fee is required to enter the park and will be waived if you have the Interagency Pass. So if you don’t have the Interagency Pass, you will be paying $24/person or $9/person if you do have the pass.

How Do I Get My Ticket?

There are only 24 spots available with 12 of those reservable online. The other 12 are reserved for walk-ins. If you can, we recommend getting your reservations in advance. You can do so by calling 877-444-6777 or visiting Recreation.gov. Pro-tip: The online reservation is only available a month in advance and can be booked up very quickly. If you can’t get your reservation, try getting to the park as soon as it opens and try your luck there. We were able to get our tickets this way.

If you’re reserving your ticket online, you will be paying $1 to reserve your spot. Then, you’ll have to pay the additional $8 park entrance fee when picking up your tour ticket at the visitor center. You’ll need to do so at least 30 minutes before the tour.

Other Info You Need to Know

The rangers usually conduct blackouts where they briefly turn off all the lights. The cave will be in complete darkness. We think it’s a pretty cool feature of this tour but you might not enjoy it.
Bring a jacket – at a constant 56 degrees, it’ll get cold.
Wear sturdy, comfortable shoes – Although the trail is paved, it can be steep at certain areas. You will need these shoes for exploring the Big Room after this too.
Speaking of the Big Room, you will be able to explore this beautiful place before and after your tour. And we highly recommend you do so. It is amazing!

The Adventure

Meeting Up with the Ranger

Our Carlsbad Caverns King’s Palace Tour starts at 1:30 pm, which gives us plenty of time to hike down to the meeting point via the Natural Entrance trail. The meeting point is near the elevator in the Big Room. You can either hike down using the Natural Entrance trail or by the elevator at the Visitor Center.

Our group gathered at the meeting point as Ranger Topher went over some rules as well as an introduction about Carlsbad Caverns. After that, Ranger Topher proceeded to lead our group toward the gated entrance of King’s Palace. From here, we followed the paved path, descending a steep hill before reaching the first chamber of the tour. At this point, we’re about 830ft deep underground.

Getting Down to the Carlsbad Caverns King’s Palace

In the Big Room, the trail has a railing along it. Therefore, even though you’re very close to all the rock formations, it feels impersonal. At King’s Palace, the path has no railings. It weaves through towering stalagmites and stalactites columns and ducks under giant draperies. This way, it felt like we were the early explorer, exploring Carlsbad Caverns back then.

It was crazy that even though we already had our minds blown away by the beauty of the Big Room tour earlier, the King’s Palace still took our breath away. This place feels like an art museum created by Mother Nature, and all the pieces are exquisitely sculpted by magic. Even though they all have the typical cave geology names such as columns, draperies, popcorns, soda straws, or flowstone, they are so much more than that. It’s hard to describe how special this place is.

The Blackout

Along the way, Ranger Topher stopped multiple times to show us all the interesting formations and features of King’s Palace. Topher also gave us a lot of insights about the caverns. Near the end of the tour, Topher asked if we were ready to see how dark the cave could get. Then, she led us into the King Chamber and proceeded to turn off all the artificial lighting. Suddenly, the cave plunged into complete darkness.

As if everyone agreed ahead of time, we all held our breath. For a few minutes there, we could feel the coldness of the cave creeping in. The sound of water dripping also seemed a lot louder, echoing through the cave. It was such a weird feeling. I don’t think we had even been in that complete stillness before.

After a few minutes, Ranger Topher lit a small lantern that she had with her. Under the flickering light, the cave became ominous. It was crazy to think that all the beautiful sculpted limestones that we saw under the bright light would become so threatening. We couldn’t imagine how all the first recorded explorers, explored these caves with just a small lantern or torch. The cave felt so vast and scary. And if they lost their only light source, they probably couldn’t find the way out.

The Rest of the Tour

With the lights on, we were able to appreciate how wondrous the inside of this chamber is. These chambers such as the Queen or the King Chambers are massive galleries of draped stone curtains and columns. Some of them remind us of melting candles, chandeliers, greek columns, flowy fabric, or our favorite, an elephant’s butt. Every surface of the King’s Palace is roughened, embellished, or tasseled with more stones. These stones are bent and curved as if they were alive and would move with just a gust of wind.

If you haven’t visited Carlsbad Caverns yet, we highly recommend making a trip here. And don’t forget to do the King’s Palace tour. It is very worth it! If you’re looking for more things to do, check out White Sands National Park. It’s not that far from here and it’s another unique spot.

Happy Adventuring. Don’t forget to check out the related posts below for more inspiration on your upcoming adventures. While you’re at it, go follow us on Instagram and subscribe to our Youtube channel! We’ll love you forever!

These are the gear that we personally use and find them helpful for this particular adventure. Don’t forget to check out our Recommended Gear section as well.

adventure gear

This is our favourite hiking shoes. We use them for canyoneering as well. Lots of traction. Vy’s version.

Dustin’s version for La Sportiva shoes

There isn’t a lot of shade in the desert. Make sure to use lots of sunscreens! We use eco-friendly, reef-safe sunscreen, Stream2Sea SPF 30.

Face sunscreen is also important. We love these tinted, organic All Good Organic Sunscreen Butter.

You should bring plenty of water on your hikes. Vy loves the Camelback L.U.X.E.

For shorter hikes, the Patagonia Women’s Nine Trails Pack 18L is perfect to hold water and your essentials.

Sedona can get very cold in the winters and springs. We love our packable Patagonia Puff Jackets! You can get Vy’s version here, and Dustin’s version here.