The Cumberland Caverns Christmas Party (CCCP) is held every year around mid December. It is a long-standing tradition for the many TAG cavers that attend. Mostly the same cavers attend every year because the number of tickets for the banquet is limited. A large number of non-cavers also attend. Even if you do not have a ticket you can show up after dinner is served and just walk in the unguarded entrance. Sometimes the lights are out so bring a light.

In a typical CCCP everyone shows up and parks in the field, walks to the entrance, and stays in line until the guides let everyone in. You then go the Great Hall where you stand in line and get your food. It is quite a logistical problem to serve several hundred people hot food deep in a cave. Because of this, sometimes the food is not really hot. This is why I avoid dinner even when someone offers me a ticket.

After dinner the choir from the local high school in McMinnville sings Christmas carols. The owner of Cumberland Caverns, Roy Davis, then puts on his Christmas carol slides and the audience sings along. After that Roy gives his traditional Christmas sermon, then tells a few stories of what he has been up for the last year and what is planned for the upcoming year.

A cave tour to the end of the Hall of the Mountain King is offered and about 10-15 people usually go do that. Marion Smith, Alan Cressler, and I almost always stay to the end to take the tour even tough we have seen it more than a dozen times. It delays having to go out in the cold or rain. Almost every year during the CCCP it is either bitter cold or raining or both. An even smaller number of people stay and camp out afterwards. AP