CREW!!

What a glorious day to be outdoors so we had great traveling weather before spending almost the entire day underground. Really pretty ride up through NW GA to our destination of Pettijohn's Cave outside LaFayette, GA. The group riding with me, Sam, Nathan, Charles, and Craig, politely serenaded me with snores and sleep whistles to keep me awake and happy on the drive. In contrast to that, my rear view mirror showed me that Chris and Kathy were really yucking it up and having lots of laughs. Lara was nowhere to be seen and clearly belonged in my car with the other hibernators. A quick stop on the way up at a Hardees brought out that trademarked Chris grin (one of many for the day). After a final porcelain stop, we were at the meeting point with minutes to spare. After waiting for our guides for a little short of half an hour (which gave Lara a chance to beat up Chris as a warm up for the day), I managed to get phone service and discovered that we were actually about 300 yds short of our rendezvous. That soon remedied, we got our gear, had our usual safety, cave ecology and leave no trace discussion, and were off to the cave mouth. Unlike last year when we bushwhacked across country for miles to get to the cave, Pettijohn's Cave is up a short, plainly marked path from the parking area. We stopped to pose for the obligatory "before" picture and were soon deep underground. Our parking lot cave environment talk had included a description of animals and other critters that we might encounter. We were told that it would be highly unlikely for us to see a cave salamander since our guides had seen them with their groups only a few times over the space of many years of caving. We had barely started and immediately spotted a salamander! Good start to what proved to be a great day. We saw bats on many occasions and one visited closely with Lara, one with me, and two with Sam. Several times we saw bats that had been hanging so long that condensation had formed over their bodies like a shiny jewel enveloping them. Really neat looking. Other critters that we saw were cave beetles, cave spiders, cephalopods, and spring tails (small, white bugs with tails that let them jump prodigiously. Hence the name). Pettijohn's Cave is well traveled but has many interesting formations and, particularly, many interesting passages. We scaled up and down rocks, crawled through lengthy narrows, and went through areas that would make a Chinese puzzle proud. One spot was a 25 foot long narrow worm hole with two 5 inch deep ruts along the bottom where years of boot toes had drug through the mud. In one passage we had to start off on our backs, shift over on our left side with our legs spread, and then belly flop before corkscrewing up, back and around to get up to the next level. We saw stalactites, stalagmites, columns, soda straws, dragon's teeth, curtains, bacon (neat looking but made me hungry), flow rock, limestone with embedded, ancient crustaceans, limestone dams, and things with names that I can't recall. We went through spots where we could just crouch over our boots and slide down slope, spots where we slid without really meaning or wanting to, and spots where there was just a wide crack for us to wiggle through, often seemingly for yards and yards. About two thirds of the way we came to a spot where the last several groups that had gone in with our guides had backed out instead of tackling the traverse. Not us!! After an appropriate reconnoiter, we just flat out dusted that passage. Yea, Cave Crew!! Throughout the seven plus hours that we were underground, everyone did great. Nathan was all over the place like a puppy on a spring day. Sam always had a grin and was keeping a running banter of jokes and songs. We were even treated to a boy choir rendition of the Sir Lancelot song with Charles and Nathan pitching in. Lara held up the honor of the female Crew by tackling everything in glorious fashion while managing to pick on Chris most of the time. Speaking of Chris, he was the grizzled pro of the group having done quite a bit of caving in W Va while away at school. It was great to have him back on a Crew trip. Craig just seemed to flow from one spot to another without any appreciable effort. Charles was our gauge for how (and whether) to get through. With me towards the back, if Charles could get his big frame through, we were all clear. Charles was also quite the tailgater (as were most of us) as witnessed by the clear imprint of his headlamp on the back of Craig's clothes. Kathy kept me from showing how tired I got by being our adult Energizer bunny. Our guides, Sean and Javier, were just terrific as usual. Be sure and ask Javy when you see him about the natural gas formation he discovered which motivated him to quickly pass Chris and warn the rest of us. Our route took us through a big circle so that we didn't backtrack through any section that we had already seen until right at the end. After the usual "after picture" (man, were we muddy!), we headed to the parking lot for a quick clean up and change of clothes before traveling home by way of Don LoLo's Mexican restaurant in LaFayette (yum, yum, but heaven knows I could have eaten asphalt at that point and been happy). Maybe I ache today instead of just being sore, maybe the first attempt to wash our clothes looked like a dark cappuccino and the second a strong tea (it took three tries to get clean), but it was definitely worth it. I would go again with any of you just as soon as I can walk upright.

Don W.
Advisor, Crew 149