Cave and Wave

Lost World Caverns, looking up towards the entrance to the wild side

I just got back from the third year of helping out at the Girl Scout Cave and Wave resident camp... though this year, they took of the "wave" part and just went caving. Which all of us caving adults found a little weird: the girls went to camp on Sunday, drove up to West Virginia on Monday, caved Tuesday, drive home Wednesday, then spent Thursday through Saturday just doing camp stuff. We figured that for what they were paying (several hundred dollars!) they would at least have let the girls cave for two days. Our regular caving program is only like $85 for two days of caving. The girls didn't seem to mind, so I guess they enjoyed arts and crafts and camp stuff like that.

Anyways, since it's a resident camp program, they need "specialists" to help out. That's where we come in. We all love the chance to help other people get exposed to caving, because you can never really be sure who will like it and who won't. I've seen athletic, outdoorsy people absolutely despise caving, and I've seen very prissy people love dragging themselves through the mud. Being staff for the camp is interesting though; we've all been spoiled by the usual caving meals (which are REALLY good!), so we all are VERY saddened by the camp food that is served us. :( The girls don't know any better, but the adults are sad. Though overall, we had fun. We might even have some of the girls come back for the regular caving trip in the fall.

Lost World Caverns, The War Club - stick figure added as frame of reference. It's 28ft tall!

In 1971, Bob Addis sat on top of the War Club for nearly 16 days to start "Stalagmite Sitting" as an entry in the Guinness Book of World Records.

I didn't bring a camera this trip, so I have no pictures this time, so I swiped some from Lost World Caverns. We are close friends with the Steves (yes, two men, both named Steve) who own the cave, and they are the best! We just love them. Big Steve led the camp girls through his commercial tour Monday night, and they were all thrilled. Very few caves are as loaded with formations as Lost World is; and even fewer are in such good shape. The Steves are working very hard to keep their cave in good condition, because even though it is their business, it is also a living ecosystem and you can't tamper too much with that.