Recreation dives underground in Mo.

BONNE TERRE, Mo. -- Rather than head outside for a recreational adventure, athletes in Missouri can head underground -- to scuba dive, play tennis and, if one man has his way, even try their hand at subterranean ice skating or kayaking.

Missouri is often called the Cave State, with an international reputation for its natural marvels. But it's the state's mining history that has created huge manmade caverns that have been recast as underground recreational areas.

Businessman Tom Kerr has a $50 million plan to convert an 8-million-square-foot sand mine into an athletic complex housing extreme, recreational and Olympic-level facilities near Crystal City, Mo.

And Kerr is planning the facility about a half-hour drive from Bonne Terre Mine, a billion-gallon underground scuba diving site located in a former lead mine that a suburban St. Louis couple, Doug and Cathy Goergens, bought in 1979. They converted the now-partially flooded mine into an attraction that National Geographic Ad­venture magazine placed in the top 10 of its 100 best adventures in America earlier this decade.

Huge caverns have been carved out where lead ore was removed using the room-and-pillar method of mining. The caverns are now lit with motion-sensitive path lights. The underground waters are surprisingly blue.

The Bonne Terre Mine, with 24 dive trails, draws 15,000 divers annually and another 30,000 tourists who tour and learn the mine's history, said Doug Goergens.

Kerr's recreation complex, called Crystal City Underground, is being planned to draw thousands of visitors. Kerr, who owns St. Louis-based Fiesta Corp., is proposing a host of underground recreation from rock climbing to skating to swimming, with individual operators renting out venues in the complex, with an attached convention center. Above ground, he envisions softball fields, football fields, an equestrian center and more. Food and shopping will be part of the mix, he said.

In southwest Missouri, tennis players hold matches underground, on two illuminated courts in an underground cavern. The property is owned by AmeriCold Logistics Inc., an Atlanta-based food distribution services company.

But Nancy Sanders has played tennis there since 1977 at Underground Racquets Ltd., where it naturally stays about 68 degrees, and conditions are always right for playing.

"There's no wind; there's no sun; there's no heat," she said.