Wisconsin’s Longest + Deepest Canyon Has Places Sun Hasn’t Seen in 50,000 Years

Our family recently returned from a trip to the Wisconsin Dells. It was our second time to the Dells, and we wanted to experience some different things. We've done the Duck Boat tours, Mount Olympus, Go Karts, Mini-golfing, Ripley's Believe It Or Not, The Tommy Bartlett Water Show (RIP), and others. One thing we hadn't done yet was the Lost Canyon Horse Tours.

We saw an ad for it and thought it could be worth checking out. After Apple Maps led us to the wrong location, we eventually were able to find it at 720 Canyon Road, right across from Lake Delton.

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The tour has horse-drawn carriages that bring you through Wisconsin's Deepest + Longest Canyon, and it gets really tight! It was back in 1956 that Dr. Erbert realized he could get a carriage through the canyon and started doing tours. That makes it the second-oldest tour in the Dells, behind the Upper Wisconsin Dells Boat Tour.

The canyon stretches a mile long, and in some places, it's so tight that the guide has to maneuver the horses perfectly. It's amazing to see how the horses know the route and how close they get to the rock walls.

Some of the spots in the deepest part haven't seen sunlight in 50,000 years. There's even freshwater that drips from the cliff walls, and even in drought years, they are able to get water for the horses.

One of the fun parts of the tour is looking for interesting rock formations in the canyon. It's kind of like looking at clouds, everyone sees something different. One of the rock formations looks like an eagle, others are up for interpretation.

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One thing that really impressed us about the business was how they treat their horses. They have multiple teams of horses that only work a few days of the week and get rotated through. Once the horses reach their retirement age, they live out the rest of their lives at the stables. Instead of selling the horses when they get old, the owners feel the horses deserve a nice retirement so they get plenty of food, and get to walk the canyon still for leisure. That's pretty neat.

Tickets were reasonable. I think we paid $12 each to go on the 30-45 minute tour. That's not a bad price for something to do in the Wisconsin Dells.