So, finally I got time to write about one of my best experience in US... The Devil's Icebox!!!
Its a cave located near Columbia, about 10 miles long in its full length, no sign of outer atmosphere and light, no man made structures, no human being, about 6 species of bates, full of wet and very wet mud, lot of small hole to pass on, very low tempeture and flowing water springs (some places its as deep as 9-10 feet). So the total package makes it true adventure.
Pre-preparation-> I have been told to buy at least two waterproof headlamps with super bright light, a water proof torch, learn about Kayaking, but a pair of very good mud shoes and get ready to put life at risk...
And here it starts-> I reached at base office at about 8:00 AM in morning, after checking all equipments they told us to get to parking area close to the cave (about .5 miles away). They gave us Kayak there each wt. about 60 pounds and told us to lift them and carry to the entrance of cave. It was a group of 9, we took out Kayak to entrance passing through some wooden ladders and muddy pathways.
Just at the entrance of the caves, on top of my surprise it was a deep water spring and we have divided us in a group of two with one Kayak each, as soon as we got in I got to know that me any my partner, we both are novice in Kayak and we were the last one to follow the whole group, after passing half way on some shallow water area our group leader has changed our partners. Then after 45 min of peddling we have reached to the first point, there we left our kayaks and start walking down. It was smelling really bad there with lots of bats poo...
We were walking on muddy surface, through water spring up to 4-5 feet deep and through some natural holes with whole body in mud, but really after some time I started enjoying that mud too, putting myself down and crawling through those small pathways at about 12:00 PM we reached on some plane surface. We stayed there for lunch (that was with me in my backpack, in a waterproof container) and then at 12:30 PM we started walking towards waterfall... this was rather easy way to pass on and at about 2:00 PM we reached there. It was one of the most beautiful structure I have seen in my life... simply amazing, how water has made such a beautiful thing by sedimentation.
As return journey always took less time, so on the common consensus we decided t0 take a new way and also to look into most of the muddy holes to make journey more adventurous. I must say, it was hell of a difficult journey back... I slept couple to times and two time I was skidding like anything on muddy ground and towards water body (thank god it was shallow there!). After looking into a lot of holes and couple of bat colonies we reached to our kayaks and this time we were leading the whole group with my new partner and covered the whole 45 min journey in 30 min.
After reaching outside, it was a pleasant feeling to see sunlight after almost 9 hours. It was 5:30 in my watch and again after taking our kayaks to parking area I tore out some of the trash bags in my car and tied them to seat as the whole body and cloths were in mud.
We drove back to base camp and it was time to clean all the stuff, thanks to high pressure pipe most of the stuff was clean in one hour. Me and my partner were starving like anything so we decided to go to Cici's pizza (eat unlimited pizza, pasta and salad in $4.49 ;-))...
After that great lunch and dinner, its time to go back home to prepare for next day adventure at six flags!!! The whole body was in pain... but I was enjoying that and thus ends one of the exciting day of my life!!!
P.S.- It was hard to explain the whole adventure in words... I will upload pictures soon on this page...
Its a cave located near Columbia, about 10 miles long in its full length, no sign of outer atmosphere and light, no man made structures, no human being, about 6 species of bates, full of wet and very wet mud, lot of small hole to pass on, very low tempeture and flowing water springs (some places its as deep as 9-10 feet). So the total package makes it true adventure.
Pre-preparation-> I have been told to buy at least two waterproof headlamps with super bright light, a water proof torch, learn about Kayaking, but a pair of very good mud shoes and get ready to put life at risk...
And here it starts-> I reached at base office at about 8:00 AM in morning, after checking all equipments they told us to get to parking area close to the cave (about .5 miles away). They gave us Kayak there each wt. about 60 pounds and told us to lift them and carry to the entrance of cave. It was a group of 9, we took out Kayak to entrance passing through some wooden ladders and muddy pathways.
Just at the entrance of the caves, on top of my surprise it was a deep water spring and we have divided us in a group of two with one Kayak each, as soon as we got in I got to know that me any my partner, we both are novice in Kayak and we were the last one to follow the whole group, after passing half way on some shallow water area our group leader has changed our partners. Then after 45 min of peddling we have reached to the first point, there we left our kayaks and start walking down. It was smelling really bad there with lots of bats poo...
We were walking on muddy surface, through water spring up to 4-5 feet deep and through some natural holes with whole body in mud, but really after some time I started enjoying that mud too, putting myself down and crawling through those small pathways at about 12:00 PM we reached on some plane surface. We stayed there for lunch (that was with me in my backpack, in a waterproof container) and then at 12:30 PM we started walking towards waterfall... this was rather easy way to pass on and at about 2:00 PM we reached there. It was one of the most beautiful structure I have seen in my life... simply amazing, how water has made such a beautiful thing by sedimentation.
As return journey always took less time, so on the common consensus we decided t0 take a new way and also to look into most of the muddy holes to make journey more adventurous. I must say, it was hell of a difficult journey back... I slept couple to times and two time I was skidding like anything on muddy ground and towards water body (thank god it was shallow there!). After looking into a lot of holes and couple of bat colonies we reached to our kayaks and this time we were leading the whole group with my new partner and covered the whole 45 min journey in 30 min.
After reaching outside, it was a pleasant feeling to see sunlight after almost 9 hours. It was 5:30 in my watch and again after taking our kayaks to parking area I tore out some of the trash bags in my car and tied them to seat as the whole body and cloths were in mud.
We drove back to base camp and it was time to clean all the stuff, thanks to high pressure pipe most of the stuff was clean in one hour. Me and my partner were starving like anything so we decided to go to Cici's pizza (eat unlimited pizza, pasta and salad in $4.49 ;-))...
After that great lunch and dinner, its time to go back home to prepare for next day adventure at six flags!!! The whole body was in pain... but I was enjoying that and thus ends one of the exciting day of my life!!!
P.S.- It was hard to explain the whole adventure in words... I will upload pictures soon on this page...
1 comment:
Must have been hell of an adventure.. Waiting for the pics.. :)
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