Cross country hiking, three caves and a treat overlooking Lake Roosevelt on the return. Lots of critters and a few flowers. On my soapbox for a moment---
Cave conservation--- no matter what flavor caver you are people need to pay attention and exact care for some of the caves they visit. We went to a cave that many years ago, after a short crawlway, a big room with white flowstone, orange flowstone and a formation that looked like little white golf balls in a cluster. The cave was sealed in between visitations with natural means to control the amount of silt and debris from running water. Lately people have left it open. Now the big room has massive mud in it, no more white or orange flowstone, a little up high, and the golf balls are slimy brown. To top it off muddy bootprints climbing what remains of the pristine orange flowstone when the main passage is obvious and not on that flowstone. So we spent four hours constructing a sieve in a narrow part of the passage to control flow and then constructed a second barrier to discourage visitors. Gating or not gating the cave isn't the problem. If you don't know what the F&&*(((k you are doing stay out. Ignorance isn't acceptable.
End of rant.