Camuy River Caverns

cav­er­nas-del-rio-camuy

NOTE: THIS PLACE WAS IN A SAD STATE OF REPAIR FOLLOWING HURACANES IRMA AND MARÍA. THERE HAS BEEN CONFLICTING INFORMATION ABOUT THE PRESENT STATE OF THESE FACILITIES. WE TRIED TO CONTACT THEM BUT THEY DIDN’T RESPOND. THE IMAGES BELOW ARE OF WHAT IT ONCE WAS. WE CAN NOT RECOMMEND IT.

About 20 min­utes south of the Areci­bo Radio Tele­scope Obser­va­to­ry (which, by the way, does­n’t exist any­more either), on road 129, are the Camuy Riv­er Cav­erns; one of largest cave sys­tems in the world! And while they are not the absolute largest, they are cer­tain­ly the most beau­ti­ful (I’m biased).

Under­neath it all you’ll hear the Camuy Riv­er —the third largest under­ground riv­er in the world— roar­ing through with all its might. This alone makes the carverns unique. But wait, there’s more. The Camuy Cav­ern Sys­tem sits inside a lus­cious trop­i­cal for­est. Vis­i­tors descend to the caves through a huge sink­hole, aboard a trol­ley, guid­ed by trained personnel.

Only a small part of the sys­tem is open to the pub­lic.  The entire sys­tem is com­prised of 10 miles of cav­erns, 220 caves and 17 entrances.  But believe me, the part that you will see is well worth the vis­it. Cue­va Clara is the largest cave open to the pub­lic at this time and at its tallest point it mea­sures 170 feet. That means that you could fit a 17 sto­ry build­ing inside this cave alone.

A short trol­ley ride away is “Sum­idero Tres Pueb­los” a 400-foot deep sink­hole that sits at the inter­sec­tion of the munic­i­pal­i­ties of Camuy, Hatil­lo and Lares.

The park cov­ers a 268-acre plot of land and has ample park­ing facil­i­ties, a cafe­te­ria, a small the­ater and a gift shop.  Trol­leys go down to the caves every 15 min­utes, but the park admin­is­tra­tion lim­its the amount of vis­its per day for eco­log­i­cal rea­sons. Vis­i­tors are giv­en a num­ber until a dai­ly quo­ta is reached.  Your best bet is to arrive before 10 in the morning.

When it rains the park clos­es down. Why?  Because the place is damp and slip­pery enough as it is.  So if the day is grey and rainy, save your­self the trip, because you prob­a­bly won’t get in.

Get Directions

From 

To 

Add Waypoint 

For  Driving Walking Transit Bicycling

show options  hide options 

Avoid Tolls  Avoid Highways  Avoid Ferries 

Print directions  Reset directions 

Fetch­ing directions.…..

Reset direc­tions
Print direc­tions