Sam, Kevin (FP resident volunteer), Bill and I went on a hike to a bat cave about 3 hours away from the station. We met up with some local folks - John, Pastor David, and bunch of kids who served
as our guides. We hiked about 2 hours before we got to the cave, and then spent about an hour in the cave. I can't say I was real excited about going into a cave, much less a bat cave - but after last weekend, I thought I would give it a go. It appeared as someone had recently been in the cave and killed a bunch of the bats, I can't say I was disappointed. We did have to watch out for bat pekpek as we placed our hands on the walls to steady ourselves. We saw the famous stalactites (on roof) and stalagmites (on ground), it was pretty neat.We started the descent into the bat cave by repelling down an 18 foot waterfall. We were all soaked after that, but we kept going. Thankfully Sam said something about a plastic bag for the camera or we would have been in trouble. We made our way through the cave by the use of our headlamps (a very practical Christmas present). At times we worked through narrow
passages, at oth
ers we had to crawl through on our hands and legs. At one pt, there was another smaller waterfall that we had to go down. As I looked, I wasn't quite sure where to put my feet, but I gave it a go. Thankfully, Sam and Bill had gone ahead of me and were watching from below in the water. They caught me as I fell a few feet when my foothold didn't quite hold up. We made it to the end of the cave, where we looked down another long waterfall descent - apparently no one has gone down there and we weren't going to be the first. On the way back, Bill detoured us slightly off course, the same detour that I had taken on the way in, how was he to know that the way was actually 5 feet above us, not on the ground beneath?
We finished in the cave, had some lunch, and then started back on our well marked out trail. On the way there, much of the trail was just bush that was cleared with a bush knife, so on the way back, we actually had some idea where we were going. John and Pastor David tried to make fire for us using bamboo and some brush, but they couldn't get it. Instead, they made traditional bush hats for us to wear as we walked back. Sam and Kevin stayed to sleep out in the bush, but Bill and I kept coming to home with warm showers and comfortable beds.
