Caving

It is amazing the diversity of the people a person comes in contact with. Like I am always saying, we all have story's but it is hard to pry them out of some people.
I worked with a pipefitter and we used to do a lot of talking. He is a hillbilly from the Winchester, Tennessee area. His name is Bill and he looks like a stereotypical hillbilly, except he is not as he seems. Ole' Bill is a tall lanky sucker. Slow talking and with the backwoods drawl. He has a beard that looks like when it got too long he just pulled a bunch out. Sorta gappy and holey like. He always reminded me of Festus on the old Gunsmoke series.

Bill was in Force-Recon with the Marines in Nam. He was one of those nuts that would go I the tunnels to rout out the enemy. Bill is kind of guy that would go bear hunting with a switch!

He was and is a runner. It was talking with him that got me into scuba diving. He was trained in it in the Marines along with rock climbing and such. His stories were so interesting that I could not resist taking it up. 29 years ago it was. It was after he had been to Tortola and had dove on the Rhone that I got the diving bug. His storys were great and about ten years ago, I dove the Rhone. That is where the movie “The Deep” was made.

After I had climbed Devils Tower he got the urge. As I said, he had done quite a bit of rock climbing in the Marines. As I did, he and his son started going to the climbing wall in town to work on their skills. It was only a 52 ft wall but was very good practice. HE and his son hit the climbing wall steady that winter. The next summer he and his son headed west and they climbed the tower. A hell of a lot faster than I did, I might add.
Bill is always laughing with that damn backwoods, haaw-haaw-haaw. He sounds a lot like a lazy damn Mule and I guess that is what he resembles. He is as good natured a feller as you would want to meet but I don't figure to cross the guy. Long and lean and hands like meat platters, he has.

I only saw him mad one time and it were not purty. He had this damn marine barracks hat from when he was in Nam. He wore that thing for years! It was like a friend to him and had seen him through many a rough day. It was like a part of him and I really don't know if he took it off to shower or not. Well I take that back. That rattyassed thing had never seen soap and water.

Bill and his partner at the shop, Bill was a Pipefitter, had been working on an airmakeup on the roof when his buddy opened a door, right next to Bill. The vacuum of the fan sucked that hat off his head and up through the fan. They never even found lint of that damn hat and Bill went nuts. His partner went to running and Bill was too busy screamin and slobbering to kill him. Being of natural good nature, he settled down. If that boy thinks he is forgiven he is nuts.

Down in the Winchester area is a Spelunkers paradise. There are caves and caverns all over the place. Many of them are commercialized and tame like, with walkway and such. I have, over the years, been in a bunch of them. They are interesting but I had always thought I would like to see a wild one.

Ole' Bill and I got to talking about it. He had been a cave rat all his life. He invited me to come down at Thanksgiving that year, about 10 years ago, and join them for dinner and then we would go a caving. He said his kids loved it and would join us. His daughter was about 24 and son about 15 I guess.

Hell, I figured it would be pretty damn easy if those kids were gonna do it. Little did I know that those damn kids could live on bark and lichens and would fight a damn seagull over road kill! The old Acorn had not fallen far from the tree!

I went out and bought the helmet and light that he recommended. You gotta have a good light and a backup if you were smart. It sure can get dark down there 4 or 5 hundred feet in a wild cavern. I didn't really realize what the conditions were gonna be down there. I had watched TV shows about Spelunking but they did a poor job of conveying the conditions a person could encounter!

When the time came I took off for southern Tennessee and the caves. I drove down alone as he and his family were going early. Also I wanted to go to Chattanooga to visit and detect with my buddy, Tommy Aaron.

When I got there I was tired. I drove nonstop from Michigan and that was a long haul. I got a room at a local motel and called Bill to let him know I was in town.
We made arrangements for him and the other spelunkers, of whom I had not met, to pick me up and the Motel. We were then to go to a restaurant to get breakfast. Then I crashed for the night.

Next morning, bright and early, Bill was a banging on the door. I was ready and we grabbed up my gear and headed for the car. There I met Bills son and daughter and also another little gal. She was only 10 but a veteran caver. I thought she would have problems keeping up but I was sure wrong!

We stopped at a restaurant for breakfast. I ordered three eggs and sausage with a fist full of toast. Corse they threw on a half plate of the damn "Snail snot' they call grits. You plop a knife full of butter and a bunch of honey on that stuff and it went down just fine.
I looked at Bills plate and he had a damn biscuit and a cup of coffee! That sucker is about 6ft 2in and 185 or 190 and he was gonna go under ground for a day on a damn biscuit and a cup of coffee!! Haaw-haaw-haaw says he! That will be plenty! I get hungry under there and I will just catch something and eat it, he says! I think he means it.

Here I was a gonna go underground with a bunch of hillbillies and they started a talking about the movie "Deliverance"! 0^0 My arse!! Poor choice of words with those hillbillies I will tell you! :0) They said I was sorta perty and all but I think they were kidding. I sure hoped they were kidding!

We finished our chow and headed for farm to meet the guy that was gonna guide us. This guy was a friend of Bills from childhood. His name is Wayne. He lived in the hills. Bill said he also owned a couple banks or something too. His love was caving though. He was the goto guy for the University of Georgia when they wanted a cave guide in the area. He had spent more time under ground than on the surface, it seems. He had stories that just made me cringe, which I might tell at a later time.

Wayne is a nice looking guy for a hillbilly. :0) He don't look nuts at all but from the stories Bill told me, he was certifiable. He seems to be a quiet sort and friendly. He was lean and all angles. He asked what we had in the way of equipment and I showed him what I had, which wasn't all that much. A helmet and couple lights, a canteen of water and a few candy bars. He said I should have had knee pads and elbow pads. Damn hillbillys! Don't think of nothing but sex. I tolt him I wasn't into that and he laughed. Haaw-haaw-haaw from that damn Bill! Wayne just said it would make my day easier. I was gonna have to watch these guys! We tossed everything in the back of Wayne's truck and hopped aboard. We had a little drive to the cave.

This country was beautiful! We were in a valley of hardwoods. The hills were thickly covered and there were still a bit of fog in some of the hollows. We took the two lane to a two track which ran up into the hills. We finally stopped at a shack at the base of a hill. We hopped out and looked around.

I looked around and didn't see a damn cave. Just saw hill. I asked where it was and he just pointed up the hill to the right.

He gave us a little history of the cave. The confederates used the cave to dig bat crap for gunpowder or something, during the war. It had been abandoned and pretty much forgotten after the war. Wayne knew of it and decided to explore it a bit. Originally the cave was thought to have been a small one. If I remember right, the original cave, which we would be going into shortly, was about a hundred feet or less deep and not as wide. It had a low ceiling, about 5 ft or so and that was after much of the bat crap had been mined.

Wayne went back to the farthest reaches of it and looked around with his light. It was hard to get all the way back as it was awful low. He was all sprawled out on his stomach in the bat crap! He was a lookin' back where the roof met the floor and thought he could see a crack. I guess it was horizontal and about a pencil width wide. He managed to work his way back and got the light beamed in the crack and all he could see was black! There was a void!

He went back and returned with cavin and diggin tools. He enlarged the crack big enough to squeeze through and found a cave system. He then explored it over the rest of the year. This is the system we were going into.

Wayne told us that he and only those he invites, goes in his cave. We were his guest and were not to do anything to deface his cave. We were to take nothing from it and that hillbilly wasn't a kidding!

We all got into our caving gear. I wore jeans and a sweat shirt with good heavy shoes. A good heavy pair of gloves topped it off. I also had on the helmet and headlight. Wayne wore similar gear but with the addition of kneepads and elbow pads. Guess he weren't a kidding! :0) We start, single file, up the hill. I still could not see any damn cave or anything resembling one. He leads us around a boulder, about the size of a stove and points. Damn! That was a cave? There was a hole with boulders and brush in it. It wasn't much larger than two bathtubs but led down and into the hillside. I was doing a lot of assuming here as I could not really see much in the way of a entrance.

Wayne led off and I was second or third, I don't remember which. As soon as we got underground, into the first cave, I saw how hard it must have been to mine this crap. The cave was about 5 1/2 ft high but that is where all the crap had been taken out. We could not stand up anywhere, except for the 10 year old little gal of course.

There was a path cut out, I suspect by Wayne, to the rear of the first cave. We followed him back there and the fun started. We had to lay down and squeeze through the opening he had cut. It wasn't bad as I was the biggest of the bunch and I managed to squeeze though ok.

We all got through and stood up, looking around. It was still pretty narrow, about 15 or 20 ft and maybe 25 ft high. The floor was covered with boulders and slabs of rock that had fallen from the ceiling over time. There was no path here. We had to scramble over and around the boulders, which was no mean feat as this was not what you could call a dry cave. It was damp and the floor was mud. Sorta a clay mud that stuck to you and your feet. That was ok but I had not expected that. The tame caves I had been in were always dry.

We were following Wayne when we came to a big pit. It was about 25ft across and maybe 25 or 30 ft deep. We had to be very careful as their were huge slabs of rock hanging from the ceiling and loose boulders everywhere. We had to be aware as to where we put our feet and hands as we could be in trouble if we had a cavein.

I forgot to mention that we had harnesses for such places. We were gonna have to repel down the wall. We had all had experiences with repelling as we made some mighty long repels coming down off Devils Tower. This was a piece of cake. In fact I didn't really have to repel, I just hand lined down. The little girl and the young people repelled down though. I thought it was just easier and faster to just backwalk the rope down.

We all reached the bottom without much problem and we were off again on Wayne’s tail. A room opened up before us. It was about 40 ft wide and had a very low ceiling. Damn thing was only about three ft high. Too low to crawl and it was gonna be a bit&h to get through. It looked like we had to go a hundred and fifty ft or more to the other end! The floor was an inch of mud! Wet slimy mud!

Ole Wayne was a grinnin' like a possum eating sh*t! Youall' shoulda wore the pads! He was on his belly and raised up on his knees and elbows, of course protected by the pads. Off that sucker went like a damn crab! He had done this hundreds of times and it showed. He went that hundred and 50 ft in about a damn minute!

I looked at Bill and he was a grinnin'! By god that hillbilly had the pads too! Off he went. The rest of them followed suit. The little gal was small enough to just hunker down and waddle to the end without a problem!

"Common Yankee Boy" Whatcha wainting for?" I got on my belly in that crap and started a squirming toward them. What a damn mess! There as mud on the floor but rock under that and it was hard! It was raising hell with my knees and elbows! Finally I said the hell with it and turned sideways to the direction of travel. I put my hands over my head and yelled! " I'm a commin'!" With that I just started a rolling toward them. I rolled all the way through that damn slime but I made it! I was a mess but what the hell! :0)

Now that I was with them I looked around and could not see that our situation had improved a heck of a lot! We were all hunkered together on our knees looking at Wayne for direction. He pointed his light to a low ledge and said we go that way. We laid on our bellies and worked our way after him. He rolled over on his back and hunkered forward. He just disappeared. There was a crack in the wall about, and I am guessing, 15 inches high. It was about man wide too. He shined the light back through and said to follow. It looked pretty open where he was.

Everyone squeezed through and then it was my turn. I got to my back and started a hunkering my way to the hole. I had to stretch out as far as I could to reach it and my chest was against the ceiling. Man this was gonna be a tight fit!


I got my hands through and then Bill grabbed them. I could see in the cavern they were in and it was pretty big. Plenty of room to stand up if I could get my big ass it there. He started a pulling and we got my damn head through and then had a problem. My chest was jammed. We pulled and tugged and squirmed. That damn hillbilly kept saying, "I tolt you you should not have eaten all that breakfast! Haaw-haaw-haaw" He said, "suck er in" I told the damn fool that I could not suck in my damn chest!! I am a full growed man and not no scrawny arsed hillbilly that eats a dang biscuit and a cup of coffee before a day caving!

Well they pulled and tugged and there was no way I was gonna get though that hole, I'll tell you! I felt like a bloody suppository, I was wedged in so cottenpickn’ tight. Now they had to push me back out! Now that was getting to be a dang hurtful situation! My head weren't no dadgum batterin' ram but Bill was using it as such. He was shoving on my shoulders and head and it was a mite hurtful. Problem was with the pulling to get in, I was wedged a bit.

The ceiling was against my chest and I could not really get my knees up to help me work myself out. I was a bit lacking on room to maneuver. I laid out flat and groped around with my feet to try to find a way to help myself. Finally I hooked my right foot around some damn rock or ledge or something and was able to pull a bit. This helped as it got me moving. That is a good feeling a couple hundred feet under the
tree roots! It makes a body a bit tense when he is in a situation like that and that is for sure. I think it makes your body swell up a bit and that does not help.

Finally I worked myself back the way I came. There I was. All alone on one side and they were all on the other. I was lying in a floor of mud and could not set up. This was sorta getting a bit sucky, I'll tell you that right now! Now the Bastuds started a humming and sorta singing like, Dueling Banjos. I needed that like I needed a gallon of possum piss! :0( I could hear Bill's Haaw-haaw-haaw braying like a dang mule!

Now Wayne came to the hole and shined his light at me. He said there was another way in to the left a bit. I sure the hell was not gonna get though the way they went so I headed for where he shone the light. There was barely room for me to wiggle back in the low crack he indicated.

I was on my belly and doing a sorta seal wiggle back there and saw the opening. Hell, it didn't look any bigger to me and a hell of a lot longer! Maybe not a hell of a lot but about 8 ft of rectangular tunnel, not a dang bit bigger than necessary, I will tell you!

This route had not been used it seems. There were rocks and stuff in my way so I started moving them a bit. "Hey! You are rearranging my cave!" sez Wayne! "Well no shit! I ain't no damn jellyfish! I ain't no scrawny ass damn hillbilly either. I am man sized and that dang stone has gotta go!". Sez I! And I moved it! He thought it over and said, "Well ok if you gotta!" Well I gotta!

Big Chief Haaw-haaw-haaw laid down and looked at me trying to hunch my way through the damn tunnel. "Whats wrong yankee? Need help? Haaw-haaw-haaw! Dang hilllbilly! "You bet your ass I need help! Grab my hands and drag me through!"

It took a bit of doing but he finally dragged my carcass through the hole into the first really standup place I had been in in the last 45 minutes. It was a cave about 10 or 12 ft high, 100 ft long and mebby 40 ft wide. It sorta narrowed at the far end, which was the direction Wayne headed for. You have to realize that without Wayne we would be done for as there were no trails or anything to indicate where we were to go next. If you looked behind you there was really no way of telling where you had come from either! The fact that it is as totally black, as can be , out of the range of the light beam is a big factor too!

We followed Wayne for a ways, scrambling over the piles of fallen rock that littered every cave we were to enter that day. Compared to the last so called cave, this was a walk in the park. Dang! Thunk I, which must have been the worse of it! HA!!
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I just hope I can describe this next spot so it isn't confusing. We came to the end of the cavern which was about 8 ft high with a dome like area on the left. It reminded me of a cup upside down and was higher than the rest of the cave. It was about 20 ft high and maybe 15 ft wide. I just glanced at it but my attention was on Wayne.
I guess I should tell you a little more about the cave. There were stalagmites and stalactites all over the place. Some reached from floor to ceiling and were beautiful. All of the caves were wet which wasn't all that bad if you weren't crawling through them. Once you are filthy, it doesn't make any difference anyway. The temp was around 55 degrees but we were pretty active and very comfortable. We had seen a few bats but not many.
Back to this next challenge. Wayne was down next to the floor, where there was another opening. Oh Crap! I looked at that sucker and thought, here we go again. Wayne said we had to go about 15 ft through this hole and it rose about 10 or 12 ft! It also had a curve in it! Crap!
He hunched down and was off like a damn gopher! The others followed suit. I got down and saw that they went about 6 ft and then the bend came up and to the left and they were gone. The kids got though without too much problem but then Bill went. He is long and lean like I said but he had a bit of a time getting around that damn bend! Damn! I yelled up to Wayne that there was no damn way I was gonna be able to get around that bend! Course he yelled, "Giver er a shot, Yankee!" Which I did.
You gotta crawl these things on your belly with your arms leading. I barely had room for my big ass in there let alone room for maneuvering! I did a sorta centipede crawl up to the bend and then got real tense! It is hard to keep yourself calm in situations like this. I was feeling that claustiphobia thing now but won't say it as I can't spell it! I was really tensing up and had to force myself to stay calm.
I yelled up that I could not get around that damn bend. Wayne yelled, "Waall Yankee, ya might as well take the other way!" What?? He told me to back out, which was easier than the last place as gravety helped me. I was backing down hill.
He yelled down for me to go into the domed place and look at the ceiling. I went into it and did as he said. At the top there was a hole which I could see light flashing around in. The light was coming from their head lamps. The hole looked big enough to squeeze though but was up there about 20 ft. He yelled to just rock climb the walls, which I have had a little experience with, and squeeze though the hole. He said that I was to be careful when I got through as there was a bit of a drop. Bit of a drop-right! L
I started up the wall, which was not all that hard as there were plenty of handholds. I had to be careful not to pull anything loose though. I got to the hole and started working myself up through it. It was tighter than hell but I wiggled and pulled and got far enough to set down and rest a bit. I looked ahead of me and the far wall was about 50 ft away and to my right and about 6 ft lower was the rest of the guys and gals. Wayne was closest and told me to be careful cuz in front of me was a 50 ft drop!
Now between me and them was a ledge, the one I was setting on, about 10 inches wide! There was only about 6 ft separating us but this damn 50 ft hole was a factor in my thinking, I'll tell you that for sure!
He explained exactly what I had to do to make it, and that was pretty important to me about then. In the middle of the ledge was the , going up part of a stalagmite or stalagmite ( I don't remember which is which and frankly right then, I didn't give a damn)! It was about 5 inches high and solid! I had to reach over with my right hand and get a good grip on it. You bet your ass I was gonna have a good grip on it! My feet was gonna be over 50ft of air! Then I had to roll over on my stomach and get my left hand on it. When I felt secure I had to swing my body down and over the void and swing to their side. It was not all that difficult but was damn glad they were there to grab my old ass!! J Thank god that the worse was over now!! Right! L
We were now in a fairly large cavern. I can not really remember how big it was but the going was good and it was maybe 150 ft long maybe a little bigger. I didn't measure these things, it is just the impression I got. He took us back a ways and then pointed to a hole, about 10 ft wide, up near the ceiling, on the left. He told us to go up, one at a time and take a look at something you don't see much. He also said not to go in or touch a damn thing. He ment it too!
It was a "Crystal Cave" that he had found. He said it was proof that the indians had not even found this cave as they would not have left the crystals. When it was my turn I scampered up there and looked in. It was about 20ft or so deep and 10 ft wide. It was also covered with Crystals! Thousands of them all sticking out of the walls, everywhich way. Some were pretty damn big too. Not big like a bread basket but big like a cucumber! I had never seen anything like it. I didn't know there were such things in nature. He had shown us flint nodes sticking out of the walls in the first cave. They had been broken off and he said that indicated that the indians had found a way into that cave. Interesting!
We continued back for quite a ways and the way was rather uneventful. We came to a bit cavern that was several hundred feet long and the interesting thing about it was the fact that the whole damn ceiling was peeling off! The floor was covered with rock that had fallen off, probably thousands of years ago but it was gonna be covered when this slab came down. The Ceiling was only about 20 ft high here but a slab representing half of it, about 8 inches thick, had dropped a foot or so. Damn! Our route was right under this thing and I could not help but imagine what would be left of us if it was to fall! Squershed like a damn road frog! Corse it did not fall as I ain't squershed! J I like that!
We reached the back of the system, at least as far as he was gonna take us that day and he asked us if we wanted to see some really big stalactites and stalagmites! Hell yes!
He was off again with us a following. I don't really remember how far we went but we came to another very low cavern. It was about 3 ½ or 4 ft high. Off he went like a crab and the others followed. Then I went my rolling and crabbing way after them. Damn these young brats were out to kill this ole man! J
We got way the hell back in this cavern and there was another damn crack. They had a hell of a time getting through it and there was no way I could get though! No damn way! They could see that and asked if I would mind if they went along without me. Hell I didn't care but they had damn sure better come back! The little girl, I'll call her Annie, must have been getting tired and said she didn't want to go either. Hell she had an easy time of it as she was so small! I envied her! She wanted to stay with me! I didn't mind as I sorta figured she was not my hostage in case the damn hillbillies started with their damn Deliverance crap again or decided not to come back.
Off they went and Annie and I just laid back and relaxed. It was very odd hearing their noise and conversation, fading off until it was silent. We turned off our headlamps and talked a bit but then there was silence. Total silence and blackness. I could hear my heart beat and it seemed I could hear my blood rushing in my ears. It could have been unnerving I guess but I found it relaxing after the adventures I had had. It weren't over yet either!
After an hour or so we could hear them returning. I was a bit disappointed really but was getting a bit cold, just laying there. They came back and were all excited at the things they had seen. Thankfully they had taken pictures! They said there were huge formations back there. The ceiling was only about 12 ft high and there was a joined stalagmite stalactite that had to be 6 or 8 ft in diameter in the middle of it. I have a picture of it somewhere!! Man I had missed it but it could not be helped! I ain't a gonna eat no damn biscuit for no breakfast!
We started working our way back out. As usual everything looked different in reverse. We were on a slightly different route anyway as we had made a detour to the cave I could not get into. We were making better time on the return as we had gotten used to scrambling the boulders and didn't look around as much.
I was behind Bill and we came to a spot that there was a damn hole going down into the floor of the cavern! Hell I didn't remember this! Bill looked at me and slid in head first. Damn I was alone again! Crap now what! I watched that scrawny assed hillbilly go down that hole like a gopher and watched his progress with my light. Damn, he just sorta slithered around a bend to the right and was gone.
There was no damn way I was a gonna fit down that damn tube and get around that damn bend! Now damn way! I thought what the hell and started down head first. If I got in very far there it was do or die as there was no way I could back out! I only got in a little bit when I saw I was screwed! I backed out and sat there wondering if I should just cut my throat and be done with it. L
I heard a yell and looked down the tube and saw Waynes head. He was looking up and yelled that this was the place I had to swing over the pit. Crap! It all looked different from this direction.
I looked over to my right and there was the huge black void. I looked to where the hole was and there was a dim light coming from it. They were shining up the dome and out the hole to help me see it. Good hillbilly, I thought! J
I reached over for the lump on the ledge that I had swung over on and got a good hold on it. I was on my own on this trip as nobody was there to give me a hand. The hole I was going down was a bit higher than the hand hold which meant I had to swing over and up to the spot the hole that was my passage.
Well I looked at the void which was black and got a two handed grip on the knob. Hung on and talked to myself a bit which is what I do when I am skeered! I was skeered a bit. J I said to hell with it and swung. It wasn't all that bad as is usually the case. A persons imagination can rule him if he lets it. I swung over and lifted my right foot and hooked my heel into the hole. Just rested all sprawled out like. Then I just, with my hands still on the knob and my heel hooked in the hole, wiggled my way onto the ledge. I just layed there for a minute, collecting my thoughts. Aaaah says I. Hard parts over. Right!
I finally set up and look down the hole. There is the ugly assed hillbilly, Bill lookin' up a grinnin'. "Whatcha waiting on boy? Common down!" Well I had to ease my way down feet first and then find a purchase on the wall, with my feet to put my weight on. Well I got my feet and legs through and my ass but things started going to hell about there. I groped around with my feet but could not find a damn thing to put my feet on. Damn, I had to find something or I could fall all the way to the bottom. Crap! Bill yelled up and asked what the hell the holdup was. Haaw-haaw-haaw!! Damn hillbilly!
I yelled down the problem and he started climbing the wall to guide my foot to a safe surface. I was a kicking around trying to find a place and liked to have kicked him off the wall. Hell I could not see him! I could hear him a squalling about me kicking him in the head an all. Damn crybaby!
Finally he got my feet in position and I started lowering myself and got jammed at the belt line. What had happened was I had a belt with a big western buckle. It got hungup and turned horizonal and jammed me up pretty solid. Cripes it liked to cut open! I was also getting the worlds greatest wedgy!! Going up that hole was a whole different thing than going down, I'll tell you that for sure. Man I was a hurting.
Bill was still hanging off the wall and asked what the hell was wrong. It was a bit muffled as I was hearing him through my ass at the time! Damn! I pulled myself back up the hole and told him the problem. I took my belt off and dropped it down the hole and then started down again. Everyone was down there watching except Bill and he was up there ready to spot my feet again.
I slid down but it was still a tight fit. I was a wiggling and squirming and the wedgy thing happened again. Those damn pants wanted to ride up to my throat and there was some pretty damn important stuff between where they were and my throat!~ I stopped and yelled at Bill. I said, "Grab my ass. Grab my pants and pull on them to give me some slack!" The Hillbilly sonofabitch, hanging on the side of that dome, Yelled, "Tell me you love me! Tell me you love me, Yankee!" Haaw-Haaw-Haaw!!
I yelled down, "I love you you hillbilly son of a bitch but I will deny it as soon as we get above ground!" With that and everyone laughing down there, he grabbed my pantleg and eased me down, through the hole.
Bill climbed down, laughing his hillbilly ass off all the way and I followed. I got to the floor and we all had a laugh.
Wayne lead off and we were on our way again. We finally came to the spot where we had repelled at the beginning and since we had left the rope in place, it was an easy task to just go hand over hand up the wall. When a couple of us got to the top we helped the others. It was an easy hike to the surface from there. The cave system that we had followed was abut 4 miles long if I remember right. It got about 450 feet under the mountain.
When we got to the surface we were all standing around talking and Bill started his dam HAAW-HAWWing. He was talking to Annie and they were looking at my. I asked what the hell was so funny and Bill said she had a nickname for me. She suggested "The Cave Plug"! Punk kid! What the hell does she know anyway! J
I had a ball. I was a bit tense in places but that is what it is all about. Life that is. I have not been spelunking since but if the opportunity arose I would jump at it. I was tired at the end of the day and a bit banged up but I have some great memories of it.
This is a bit long but I didn't know any other way to tell it.