Onondaga Cave

Last weekend my husband and I toured the Onondaga Cave near Leasburg, MO. We were quite impressed with the quality and quantity of formations inside the cave. If you're ever in the area, I highly recommend a visit to this cave. It sure was a whole other universe down there.

Tripods were not allowed so I had to crank up the ISO to its highest level (which I had not done with this camera), use my built-in flash, and hoped for the best. I was forced to use the handrails as my support which didn't work well with 30+ people in the group who kept bumping them.

Compositions of the formations were very limited due to placement of handrails, walkways and light/electrical fixtures. Time to compose was limited as well, as the tour needed to keep moving with another one on its heels. Plus, it's just pretty darn hard to focus on something when it's dark!!

Surprisingly, several of the shots turned out fairly well. I ran this one through Lightroom and was able to reduce much of the noise in the image.

This room is called the Lilly Pad Room because the formations on the surface of the water resemble lilly pads. (I have another shot of a different section that shows the lilly pads better.) I thought another appropriate name would be "The Colon Room" since the formation underwater looks like an intestine! The tour guide told us this formation is the most active in the entire cave and was only about 20 feet beneath the surface. There certainly was constant dripping while we were there.

Comments and/or suggestions appreciated as always.

Canon Rebel XTI, handheld, built-in flash
10-22 mm lens
ISO 1600, F4 @ 1/50