My second OAR trip of the semester, MLK weekend, was also unusual. Over 40 people, including a contingent from St. Louis, signed up for a trip near Chattanooga, which Jeff described as hiking, climbing, hang gliding or whatever anyone wanted to do. I decided this was my chance to lead a vertical caving trip. I attempted to set up a second trip that weekend, also staying near Chattanooga, but, at the time, my qualifications were unknown. Mike decided to go on this trip to officially lead any vertical caving but my input was acknowledged. Kelsey, Marcelle, Simona, and I all left early Friday and arrived at the campsite before 10. To my knowledge, we were the caving contingent, minus Mike.
The next morning when I woke up, Jeff informed me that everyone was going vertical caving and that I was to teach everyone how to use the gear. I was worried because vertical gear is complicated to use and I did not feel comfortable expecting 40 people who had never used the gear before to suddenly know what to do, especially because vertical caving is very dangerous and we only have 4 sets of gear. Marcelle and Simona also knew as well as I did that it would take all day just to get that many people down and back up again, sending gear every fourth person. Kelsey still wanted to go, so we dropped her off with the big group and decided that it would be easier for everyone if we did something else.
Marcelle, Simona, and I ventured into Chattanooga and found ourselves catching up on some homework and searching for something nearby to do. I called my mom and explained the situation. Immediately, she recommended Rock City, a tourist trap in Chattanooga. I typically avoid tourist traps whenever possible, but we decided that this one could be a lot of fun. We took tons of cheesy pictures and climbed all over the limestone. We spent several hours exploring Rock City, eating lunch over a cliff that boasts you can see seven states at once. We finally returned to downtown Chattanooga for some coffee and then headed back to camp. When we stopped at a gas station to pick up drinks, we ran into Mike, Kelsey, and a group of about 5 that had apparently been the caving group after everyone else realized it would take forever to set up. We all went to a Mexican restaurant nearby and got dinner. My table consisted of Mike, Marcelle, and Simona and resulted in two things: 1) caving at Signal Light the next day and 2) Spring Break in Colombia.
The next morning, our group headed to Signal Light, my favorite cave. We set up two ropes, Mike anchored one of the them and I took care of the other. He checked over my work and gave me some advice for the future. He trusted my rope enough to go down on it and we started exploring the cave. Normally, we don't spend a lot of time in Signal Light because Mike has been over 20 times and knows it really well. Or so we thought. We stumbled upon a muddy passage way that led to several small lagoons. Suffice to say we were soaked and coated and mud within minutes. We created mud figures, painted our names on the walls in mud, and threw hunks of mud at each other. At first, I tried walking across the muddy water with delicacy, trying not to get to wet. Eventually, however, we were all up to our waists in water. We reached a crawling section that we went through for a while before turning around and heading back out. While traversing across one part of the cave, I slipped and dislocated my left knee. I screamed and Kelsey grabbed my hand so I wouldn't slip. Everyone helped pull me up and I sat on a rock trying to fix it. I set the injury and popped everything back in to place, pressing on to the end. I was the last to ascend out and I caver coiled my rope as quickly as possible. We found a short cut down to the parking lot and after that, we went to dinner at some pizza place. We ended up with a lot of pizza because there was a special for larges, so we ordered three and they messed up one of our orders, so we had four pizzas for five people. Suffice to say we had leftovers.
When we arrived back at camp, half the group was gone or packing to leave. It was already around 8 PM, so I didn't understand why they didn't just wait to leave the next day rather than driving all night. It turned out that a lot of people had gotten sick and just wanted to go home, so our group shrank to about three cars. The next morning, my knee was still bothering me. The plan had been to go vertical caving again but Mike didn't think it was worth it and I didn't feel up to it either. We ended up going to Cloudland Canyon. I stayed back and rested while everyone else hiked and then we headed back to Gainesville.
Events occurred January 18-21, 2013
The first time I went caving, I hated it. Ironically, I love it now and it has become one of my most frequent trip defaults. Tumbling Rock was just a poor first caving experience for me, not because anything went wrong but mostly due to my own peculiarities. Caves are extremely disorienting, particularly if you don't know what to expect. Though I've learned to distinguish formations and paths, the first time I went caving I thought everything looked the same and I was certain that I was going to get lost. The biggest problem with this trip was size. Caving is best in groups of three or four and this was a trip of at least 15. It's hard to keep a large group together and realizing that you don't know what path the leader has taken is terrifying. Even though I decided at the time that I would probably never go caving again (ha!), I still thought the experience was well worth it.
Like the foam armory I had brought to Mount Yonah, I came supplied with dollar section goods: glow sticks. My plan? A "cave rave" in which everyone turns off their headlamps and we wave glow sticks around in the darkness. I still keep at least one pack of glow sticks in my caving backpack, always prepared for another spontaneous cave rave. In retrospect, Tumbling Rock is probably an ok cave. When I went though, I thought parts of it were sketchy at best, climbing, crawling, and sliding around thick deposits of mud and rock. I also did not take well to the darkness, constantly yearning for sunlight and more visibility than my dim headlamp could provide. When we emerged, I was coated in mud and grateful for rays of sunshine. Cave mud is one of the most appealing aspects of caving to me. I always loved rolling around in mud as a little girl, much to my mother's chagrin, and I still love to play in it now. I was also amused by the cave's owner's cat, who ran around our campsite and even climbed into my jacket pocket at one point.
One of the most entertaining parts of this trip was the Rock Animal Zoo, located in someone's yard nearby. We climbed around on these giant boulders painted to the likeness of several different animals, including a chicken, cows, and a giraffe. Afterwards, we hiked up to Neversink, a large pit that I have since returned to and rappelled down into. At that point, however, I barely ventured close to the edge. I was so afraid that I would fall in that I clung to trees and tried to peek from a distance. Now, whenever I go to Neversink, I flit around the edge almost to a point of danger. It was beautiful, with a steady flow of water cascading into the darkness.
The next day, my car decided against going caving again. This was perfectly fine with me but one of the girls in our car ended up switching out with someone else who didn't want to cave again. Instead, we went hiking around Cloudland Canyon. The timing was PERFECT. The leaves were beginning to change and so we had the most incredible views of thick patches of green, yellow, orange, and red.
Events occurred: October 28-30, 2011
The next morning when I woke up, Jeff informed me that everyone was going vertical caving and that I was to teach everyone how to use the gear. I was worried because vertical gear is complicated to use and I did not feel comfortable expecting 40 people who had never used the gear before to suddenly know what to do, especially because vertical caving is very dangerous and we only have 4 sets of gear. Marcelle and Simona also knew as well as I did that it would take all day just to get that many people down and back up again, sending gear every fourth person. Kelsey still wanted to go, so we dropped her off with the big group and decided that it would be easier for everyone if we did something else.
Marcelle, Simona, and I ventured into Chattanooga and found ourselves catching up on some homework and searching for something nearby to do. I called my mom and explained the situation. Immediately, she recommended Rock City, a tourist trap in Chattanooga. I typically avoid tourist traps whenever possible, but we decided that this one could be a lot of fun. We took tons of cheesy pictures and climbed all over the limestone. We spent several hours exploring Rock City, eating lunch over a cliff that boasts you can see seven states at once. We finally returned to downtown Chattanooga for some coffee and then headed back to camp. When we stopped at a gas station to pick up drinks, we ran into Mike, Kelsey, and a group of about 5 that had apparently been the caving group after everyone else realized it would take forever to set up. We all went to a Mexican restaurant nearby and got dinner. My table consisted of Mike, Marcelle, and Simona and resulted in two things: 1) caving at Signal Light the next day and 2) Spring Break in Colombia. 
The next morning, our group headed to Signal Light, my favorite cave. We set up two ropes, Mike anchored one of the them and I took care of the other. He checked over my work and gave me some advice for the future. He trusted my rope enough to go down on it and we started exploring the cave. Normally, we don't spend a lot of time in Signal Light because Mike has been over 20 times and knows it really well. Or so we thought. We stumbled upon a muddy passage way that led to several small lagoons. Suffice to say we were soaked and coated and mud within minutes. We created mud figures, painted our names on the walls in mud, and threw hunks of mud at each other. At first, I tried walking across the muddy water with delicacy, trying not to get to wet. Eventually, however, we were all up to our waists in water. We reached a crawling section that we went through for a while before turning around and heading back out. While traversing across one part of the cave, I slipped and dislocated my left knee. I screamed and Kelsey grabbed my hand so I wouldn't slip. Everyone helped pull me up and I sat on a rock trying to fix it. I set the injury and popped everything back in to place, pressing on to the end. I was the last to ascend out and I caver coiled my rope as quickly as possible. We found a short cut down to the parking lot and after that, we went to dinner at some pizza place. We ended up with a lot of pizza because there was a special for larges, so we ordered three and they messed up one of our orders, so we had four pizzas for five people. Suffice to say we had leftovers.
