Carter Caves & Cascade Falls

Cascade Cave—added to the state park in 1959 after private tours dating to the 1920s (and guiding lore back to the 1870s)—shows dripstone rooms, a lake chamber, and a roughly thirty-foot underground waterfall. Above ground, Smokey Bridge is often called Kentucky’s largest natural bridge, and a paved road still crosses Carter Cave Natural Bridge.

Locals donated about 945 acres in 1946 to start Carter Caves State Resort Park, eastern Kentucky’s big public window on karst country outside Mammoth Cave.