There is not a muscle in my body that doesn't ache. I was one of two people who'd never been seriously caving who went on the excursion; the caves were not beginner friendly.
The first one wasn't too bad; there was some awkward side shimmying going on, and the first room it opened into had like, no formations at all. It was strange. The next shimmy was much more difficult; you still had to be sideways, but if you didn't kind of climb while walking sideways, your helmet wouldn't make it through. Some really awkward maneuvering there.
This opened up into a small room that really couldn't even fit our whole group, although it was quite pretty. We were immediately ushered on to the final and most terrifying element of them all; the crawling. Now, when I say crawling, I don't mean a stomach crawl. That would have been ideal, actually. I mean that the passage was so narrow, you had to shimmy on your side, with one arm really awkwardly positioned, and just kind of hope for the best. On the way through it the first time, I literally lost my pants. I was wearing thermal under them, but that was horrifying.
On the way through the second time, the person who went in front of me had disturbed a bat, so that as I side-crawled, I took a very angry bat to the face.
The second cave was gorgeous, albeit wet; if you just gave up and walked through the water, the degree of difficulty wasn't too high, although there were some kind of difficult climbs. It was really difficult if you tried to avoid water, but really fun to maneuver. Also, the last room was gorgeous. Waterfall room.
So, yeah. I'm actually claustrophobic, but caves, even tight ones, don't seem to bother me. I actually figured I'd be freaked out crawling through water, as that's pretty much the only thing that really triggers my claustrophobia - the possibility of getting trapped underwater - I'm really weird about being in cars that go over bridges and stuff like that - but I was fine.
I fully intend to cave more often in the future. Very fun stuff! I've already gone through one of the caves that the grotto are most terrified of, with no adverse effects aside from a bat flying into my face. Enjoyable stuff.
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It's a hand-me-down, the thoughts are broken
Perhaps they're better left unsung
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