The Deep Places of the Earth

My biggest hobby, my favorite pastime, is cave exploration.  Some call it spelunking, some call it caving.  I’ve been a member of the National Speleological Society since 2003, and have been enjoying the sport for much longer than that.

Much to my displeasure, the Department of the Interior and the National Forestry Service has tightened down on our sport for now.  They have good reason, and I don’t begrudge them for it.  The spread of White Nose Syndrome among the bat population has been on the rise for a number of years now, and they are putting every effort into slowing the spread of this mysterious disease.  What this means for cavers, is that all caves that are potential bat habitats located on national property have been closed, except for very special permits.  It’s put a serious crimp in my pastime.

So, for now, I’m going to live off of the memories of past trips, and let you in on one of them.

 

I can’t remember the name of this particular cave, but since it is located in Shepherdstown, Maryland, we’ll call it the Shepherdstown cave.  When I worked in Baltimore, I met my good friend Carl, and he was brave enough to go with me on all of my caving adventures in the Old Line State.  It was our second trip to this particular cave that I’m thinking of.

After a mile walk, we reached the entrance and headed in.  There was a slight pit before the crawlway and an old wooden ladder was used to get us up to the entrance proper.  The tunnel was about three foot in height, and snaked around in an S-curve, taking us through the occasional puddle of water.  It was almost impossible to remain completely dry through this section of cave, but we did our best.

Being the second time through, we focused on squeezing into smaller holes to see if they led anywhere interesting.  I don’t know if either I or Carl could get into some of those places now.  If we did, I’m sure our backs would not be grateful for the twisting we did.  I remember one particular fissure, we had to take off most of our gear to get through, and then we found that it didn’t go anywhere beyond ten feet.

After a little exploring, we followed the main tunnel back to a seventy foot drop off.  Carl had all the vertical experience in our group, so he rigged a rope to a large stalagmite with another relief line lashed around a huge boulder.  We used the line to let ourselves down to the lower level of the cave, making sure to stay out of the pool of water at the base of the cliff.  We spent some time exploring around a huge breakdown pile that was off to the left.  At the top of the pile were some columns, stalactites, and stalagmites, some of the only speleothems in this small cave.  We ate a quick lunch before looking around some more.

Back by our rope, we spent a considerable amount of time looking for any passages that might shoot off to new sections of the cave, and sure enough, we found a hole that we had missed on the previous trip.  It was a tight squeeze in places, but I was surprised when it suddenly turned into a clay incline, that we almost slid down like a waterslide.  I could tell from marks in the earth that we were not the first to come down this passage.  Still, I was surprised when we reached the termination room.  It was small, no bigger than the interior of a minivan, but all around the room, someone had taken the soft clay and made sculptures.  On almost every flat surface, someone had taken great pains to place small humanoid figures in various poses.  None were sculpted to the point of having defined facial features, but it was a marvelous display, nonetheless.

Still to this day, I’m amazed that hundreds of feet below the surface, in a dark, tiny room made of dirt and rock, there is a hidden art exhibit for those who are brave enough to travel down and see it.  That’s just one of the many reasons that caves interest me so much.  You never know what you’re going to find when you push for that next passageway.  You may actually walk in a place that no human being has ever been before.  Who knows, maybe somewhere, in some deep crevice, there’s a small rock with a stamp on the bottom of it that says ‘Made By God’.

It brings to mind King David’s words in Psalm 95:3-4:

For the LORD is a great God, and a great King above all gods.  In His hand are the deep places of the earth: the strength of the hills is His also.

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Gage and the Cave

What was I thinking?  I don’t know.  I guess I let my love for caves overshadow my knowledge of a two year old’s behavior.  He was scared to go in the wooden crawling maze inside the gift shop, so I’m just grateful that we didn’t have any more fear crop up once we started down into the cave itself. 

Gage was my responsibility on this adventure.  You just don’t make a pregnant woman carry a twenty-six pound child down 250 slippery steps.  A pregnant woman probably shouldn’t have been going down in the cave in the first place.  Now, in my opinion, it would have been so cool if she had given birth while we were down there.  How many kids could say that they were born in a cave??  Spelunking would be my little girl’s birthright!  I ran this idea by my wife and she was neither as excited nor as in favor of the suggestion as I was.

I should have known we were in for a ride when the tour guide started off with a ten minute explanation of the history of Talking Rocks.  The only thing that saved me from having more toddler than I could handle is that we sat down next to a cute teenage girl.  He spent the entire introduction flirting with her, and boy did he turn on the charm.

Once the actual tour got started, things got a little rocky (no pun intended).  Let me just say that the boredom of a two year old is a force of nature, not unlike a hurricane or tornado.  You just kind of grab on to them and hold on for the ride.

Our entire tour consisted of climbing or descending stairs, and pausing intermittently for long periods of time while the tour guide pontificated on some odd geological nonsense or other.  I wouldn’t know because I spent these periods of time wrestling with my youngest as he climbed all over me like a rabid spider monkey.  I had to keep a tight watch on him for fear that I’d punt lose him over the side of a seventy-foot drop.  This was made worse by the fact that my arms were tired from the last three days at the water park playing ‘Gage ball’ in the pool.  Add in the little girl who had a panic attack and had to be taken to the surface, which was an extra fifteen minutes of idle standing, and I was absolutely exhausted by the time we got to the bottom.

One great feature of caves is that their temperature remains constant year round.  In the summer it feels nice and cool, in the winter it’s nice and warm.  When grappling with a bored toddler, this has no effect.  It’s sixty degrees year round in this cave, but I had sweat dripping off me in rivulets.

Boredom aside, I’m rather proud of how he handled himself.  We had a couple of close calls, once when the eight year old girl started wailing like a banshee with a saxophone; I could tell he was trying to figure out how to react to it.  Another time, when we made it to the bottom of the chasm and the guide turned all the lights out for way too long, he started to get a little tense, but we passed these experiences with flying colors.

I think I’ve learned an important lesson here, though.  When you put your child in a situation that tests the limits of their behavior, either be patient or be prepared for the consequences.