Rishi began to find it easier and easier to walk as the water became more and more shallow. There were large stones once in a while but for the most part it was easy going.
He used the current to guide him and every once in a while he would trek perpendicular to the current to check the side of the cave.
The cave was amazingly smooth here, the current also amazingly gentle, almost not noticeable. The walls became wider and wider.
He walked forward a few hundred meters and the water continued to get more and more shallow.
"There should be some structure coming, either a narrowing of the chamber or the roof above me."
Rishi stopped walking. Feeling up ward he touched the ceiling. "Lucky thing I checked. I'm going to have to be more careful."
He began walking forward scraping the ceiling with his finger tips, as it descended toward his head he thought, "I'll be crawling in a little bit."
That turned out to be quite wrong as in a few feet he stepped off the top of a water fall that didn't currently have very much water flowing off it.
"Oh Crap!" he said as he slid off the edge of the precipice. He thought, "I should have known!" He lost consciousness shortly after.
He awoke, laying on his back in shallow water. His skin burned, his head ached and he tasted blood in his mouth.
"But? I'm still alive? That's impossible," he sad out loud.
He did a body check and found all parts of him in tact, but he felt scrapes on his back. No, they were definitely cuts and his head was throbbing violently.
"I must have struck stone on the way down, but must have landed in a deep sink hole that the waterfall had gouged. That must be why I'm still alive."
This cavern was completely dark. Rishi tasted the water and strained his eyes hoping for a miracle but there was nothing to see here.
He rolled onto his stomach and swam across the flow of the water and his feet touched stone. He felt a bank and crawled onto it. Groping in the darkness he found his way to higher levels in the cave. He felt along the floor and kept climbing. If the spring thaw happened soon he would need to put distance between himself and this gentle river because it would become torrent soon.
He found a round cave entrance. A previous passage point for the river or perhaps an overflow he thought.
He climbed through it and felt glass on the other side. Six sided glass points to be precise. He crawled gingerly over the quartz and proceeded up wards.
He started to feel a bit groggy, like his head was going to float away, and decided that there was enough distance between himself and the potential flood below him. He found a large smooth crystal that reminded him of the one he'd laid on two years early and curled upon it.
He laid in full sunlight, streaming in from the top of the 1000 meter cave, but he couldn't see it because his mind had been concussed. He was lucky to be alive. But if the old man were there he would say, "luck had nothing to do with it."
He might have felt the sun, given enough time, but he had already passed out from exertion.
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Saturday, June 7, 2008
Groping in the Darkness
Rishi's back and side felt as if he had just climbed out of a molten lava pit. He ignored the pain, that was easy at this moment because the adrenalin still coursed through his blood.
"How big is this room?" He asked out loud. The echoes of his words had a noticeable delay. And unless his lessons from previous sojourns had failed to teach him, he sensed that he was on a stone precipice with wall to his right and a sheer drop off on his left.
"God I hope not," he thought to himself.
He reached to his right and felt around. Indeed the rock lead upward.
He felt to his left and there was very clearly a steep drop off.
No light. No flashlight. Nothing to see. No way to get back up to the crevasse at the top of the cave. There would be no going back today. Just like two years ago, he would have to find a new route home.
Rishi carefully sat up and crawled on his hands and knees, seeking to understand his predicament.
He approached the wall, crawling over large and small pieces of sharp rock. The rock cut into his hands and knees, and where it failed to draw blood it wore away his skin.
"I wonder?" Rishi thought and then caught himself and realized, "No. Even if he did come looking using his insight, there was no way Bob could help me."
Proceeding to his perceived precipice, Rishi carefully felt the stone. He was careful to not put too much weight on his arms, lying flat and slowly moving forward. This turned out to be a good strategy because the slight overhang that had caught him, peeled off and fell.
Rishi recoiled and sighed a relief that he hadn't been on the stone.
He paused for a fraction of a second and listened to the silence. "Something," whispered his intuition, "isn't right."
A huge splash sound rang up from beneath him. The rather large piece of rock that separated had fallen all that time and landed in water at the bottom of this cave.
Rishi explored his little area for a half hour or so. He stood up feeling along the walls. He moved stones around looking for exits. But he knew in his heart of hearts that he was trapped on a ledge, part way down this tall thin chamber.
Only one way out had been provided, and that was to swim in the dark down a cold stream which would likely carry him so deep as to make it impossible for him to ever get out.
He sat and leaned against the wall. Pain from his open wounds shot from his back out to his finger tips, down to his feet and straight up into his neck and head.
That pain hit him like a wall of fear. He instinctively knew he would go into shock if he didn't keep alert and moving. But likely that cold water and his old phobia would have the same effect.
"There's no point in waiting," he thought and he jumped off the precipice where the stone had fallen from.
He fell for much longer than he expected. Several seconds. That means he fell almost a hundred meters. "I'll know soon enough," was all he had time to think.
His body splashed into the icy cold water and the pain in his skin fired so high as to feel like numbness to him.
Relaxing, he closed his eyes and waited for his body to gently float to the surface. That was the only way to be sure which way was up.
He had not touched bottom, so the river was deep here. He was lucky and thankful.
Rishi tasted the water and listened and felt for currents. The water did not contain algae and there didn't seem to be any fast currents.
"Eenie, meenie..." Rishi thought as he swam up stream knowing that to be the safest way to travel in a subterranean river.
He swam right toward the wall that he'd jumped from and found it to be sheer and unclimbable. The stone hadn't been worn long but it had been worn enough to be too slippery to climb when wet.
He swam toward the left wall and found it to be similar to its right hand sister. A "Slippery when wet" sign flashed through his mind.
He swam up stream for several minutes along the left edge of the river. The water was gentle, calm and not so cold now that he was used to it. "I would have enjoyed learning to swim in this water," he thought, "although I'd like a rather large flash light to learn anything."
The wall was sheer its entire length and ended at a wall where there was evidence of a water fall. This chamber was fed by water from upper chambers and there was no way to go up it.
"But I can feel a current," said his geologist self.
Carefully he dove down into the water, repressing his pain, ignoring his fear. He found small openings in the stone where water flowed in but there was nothing big enough for him to swim through. Back at the surface of the water he thought, "I'm glad I don't have to decide to swim with a risk of not finding air, but honestly upstream was the preferred direction."
He allowed himself to float down stream while he thought.
Then kicking himself toward the right wall, the wall from whence he fell, he felt along it to see if there was even the slightest place to grab on.
He found one and then another and pulled himself out of the water. He methodically climbed upward and up stream. He used his fingers to find and plan every hold. He could not assess his grip with his eyes and soon he found that to be an advantage. It was slow going and in an hour or so he'd gotten to twenty feet off the water, but found there were no more hand holds. Nothing to take him any farther. Back and forth along his path he traveled for another hour. He memorized everything he used, knew where all the grips were. He sought new hand holds, new places to jam his feet. But to no avail. Ultimately he jumped and splashed back into the water.
The current had grown a bit, he could feel it. The snows were melting above him. Soon this river would be a torrent of runoff.
He floated gingerly down stream, checking the wall for hand holds or for places he could grip. He wasted countless hours climbing, only to fail and fall or have to return to the water.
The cavern he swam was long and seemed endless. "Its more like a lava tube," he mused, "than a limestone cave."
About a mile down stream he bumped his feet on some stone. It surprised him and he let out a little yelp of surprise. He summarily laughed at himself and felt another stone.
The floor came up under him and soon he was walking on broken rock, feeling the cave's edge, looking for something.
"I used to hate the green glow of that algae," he thought, "now I'd give anything to have it back."
"How big is this room?" He asked out loud. The echoes of his words had a noticeable delay. And unless his lessons from previous sojourns had failed to teach him, he sensed that he was on a stone precipice with wall to his right and a sheer drop off on his left.
"God I hope not," he thought to himself.
He reached to his right and felt around. Indeed the rock lead upward.
He felt to his left and there was very clearly a steep drop off.
No light. No flashlight. Nothing to see. No way to get back up to the crevasse at the top of the cave. There would be no going back today. Just like two years ago, he would have to find a new route home.
Rishi carefully sat up and crawled on his hands and knees, seeking to understand his predicament.
He approached the wall, crawling over large and small pieces of sharp rock. The rock cut into his hands and knees, and where it failed to draw blood it wore away his skin.
"I wonder?" Rishi thought and then caught himself and realized, "No. Even if he did come looking using his insight, there was no way Bob could help me."
Proceeding to his perceived precipice, Rishi carefully felt the stone. He was careful to not put too much weight on his arms, lying flat and slowly moving forward. This turned out to be a good strategy because the slight overhang that had caught him, peeled off and fell.
Rishi recoiled and sighed a relief that he hadn't been on the stone.
He paused for a fraction of a second and listened to the silence. "Something," whispered his intuition, "isn't right."
A huge splash sound rang up from beneath him. The rather large piece of rock that separated had fallen all that time and landed in water at the bottom of this cave.
Rishi explored his little area for a half hour or so. He stood up feeling along the walls. He moved stones around looking for exits. But he knew in his heart of hearts that he was trapped on a ledge, part way down this tall thin chamber.
Only one way out had been provided, and that was to swim in the dark down a cold stream which would likely carry him so deep as to make it impossible for him to ever get out.
He sat and leaned against the wall. Pain from his open wounds shot from his back out to his finger tips, down to his feet and straight up into his neck and head.
That pain hit him like a wall of fear. He instinctively knew he would go into shock if he didn't keep alert and moving. But likely that cold water and his old phobia would have the same effect.
"There's no point in waiting," he thought and he jumped off the precipice where the stone had fallen from.
He fell for much longer than he expected. Several seconds. That means he fell almost a hundred meters. "I'll know soon enough," was all he had time to think.
His body splashed into the icy cold water and the pain in his skin fired so high as to feel like numbness to him.
Relaxing, he closed his eyes and waited for his body to gently float to the surface. That was the only way to be sure which way was up.
He had not touched bottom, so the river was deep here. He was lucky and thankful.
Rishi tasted the water and listened and felt for currents. The water did not contain algae and there didn't seem to be any fast currents.
"Eenie, meenie..." Rishi thought as he swam up stream knowing that to be the safest way to travel in a subterranean river.
He swam right toward the wall that he'd jumped from and found it to be sheer and unclimbable. The stone hadn't been worn long but it had been worn enough to be too slippery to climb when wet.
He swam toward the left wall and found it to be similar to its right hand sister. A "Slippery when wet" sign flashed through his mind.
He swam up stream for several minutes along the left edge of the river. The water was gentle, calm and not so cold now that he was used to it. "I would have enjoyed learning to swim in this water," he thought, "although I'd like a rather large flash light to learn anything."
The wall was sheer its entire length and ended at a wall where there was evidence of a water fall. This chamber was fed by water from upper chambers and there was no way to go up it.
"But I can feel a current," said his geologist self.
Carefully he dove down into the water, repressing his pain, ignoring his fear. He found small openings in the stone where water flowed in but there was nothing big enough for him to swim through. Back at the surface of the water he thought, "I'm glad I don't have to decide to swim with a risk of not finding air, but honestly upstream was the preferred direction."
He allowed himself to float down stream while he thought.
Then kicking himself toward the right wall, the wall from whence he fell, he felt along it to see if there was even the slightest place to grab on.
He found one and then another and pulled himself out of the water. He methodically climbed upward and up stream. He used his fingers to find and plan every hold. He could not assess his grip with his eyes and soon he found that to be an advantage. It was slow going and in an hour or so he'd gotten to twenty feet off the water, but found there were no more hand holds. Nothing to take him any farther. Back and forth along his path he traveled for another hour. He memorized everything he used, knew where all the grips were. He sought new hand holds, new places to jam his feet. But to no avail. Ultimately he jumped and splashed back into the water.
The current had grown a bit, he could feel it. The snows were melting above him. Soon this river would be a torrent of runoff.
He floated gingerly down stream, checking the wall for hand holds or for places he could grip. He wasted countless hours climbing, only to fail and fall or have to return to the water.
The cavern he swam was long and seemed endless. "Its more like a lava tube," he mused, "than a limestone cave."
About a mile down stream he bumped his feet on some stone. It surprised him and he let out a little yelp of surprise. He summarily laughed at himself and felt another stone.
The floor came up under him and soon he was walking on broken rock, feeling the cave's edge, looking for something.
"I used to hate the green glow of that algae," he thought, "now I'd give anything to have it back."
Thursday, June 5, 2008
Search for the 1000 Meter Chamber
Rishi opened his eyes and looked at the six exits from the chamber of possibilities. One lead to the surface, three others lead to small caverns above this chamber and were fully mapped by old man Bob without him taking a step in them.
Rishi chuckled, "Bob," he thought. "His name is Bob."
The first of the two remaining openings were small and each was roughly 15% mapped by Rishi. But he didn't know that because he didn't know how big the caves were. Rishi had spend most of his time on the left cave because it felt as if it lead in the general of the 1000 meter chamber. Rishi had made a mistake: the left cave system was considerably larger than the right cave, but would not lead to the 1000 meter chamber. Bob had never entered these caves, but knew where each could lead.
"He wants to keep me busy huh?" Thought Rishi.
Rishi pointed to the left cave and said, "Eeenie meenie miney moe," changing the cave at which he pointed with each syllable he spoke. "catch a rishi by his toe, if he hollers let him go. Eenie meenie miney moe."
His finger rested now on the right cave, as he knew it would, so he knelt down, squashed himself flat and squeezed into the narrow and low corridor. For almost 100 meters, this tunnel was just big enough for him to get through. There it opened again into a four door chamber of possibilities.
Rishi had explored three of the four caves. He had not found the end of any of them but today was special. It marked the first day of his third year at the cave and he had saved this new tunnel for today.
He had stood up long enough to stretch and then squashed himself sideways into the tall narrow slit which was made when the stone cracked and separated. His geologist mind told him this crack was new, certainly less than a thousand years old. It was actually less than thirty years old.
As he squeezed down the cave it became more and more narrow. To the extent that he was unsure if he could continue forward without risking being stuck or not being able to get out again. He decided to go forward anyway.
He attempted to place his sideways foot farther on the path but found to his surprise that there was no floor. He had come to a precipice.
He was very wedged into that rock but he felt himself lose his balance and start to sway toward the bottomless crevasse. He attempted to put his foot back up and catch himself but there was no way to bend it to accomplish that task. He attempted to grab hold of the stone but his hands could not get leverage without the ability to bend an elbow out.
Rishi slowly slid off the edge of the precipice. As he fell the slit widened and he began a free fall.
"Well. I guess that's it," thought Rishi, "time for me to check out. You'd think Bob would have seen this coming. Perhaps he did..."
Rishi began accelerating downward into near total darkness. This cave had little or no algae which explained why he couldn't see the ledge he fell from.
For a few seconds he scraped the wall but then he felt a room open up around him.
"How far would he fall?" He thought to himself.
At that moment he felt smooth stone brush him from the left. He found himself rolling onto it until his back was downward against the surface.
The smoothness didn't last and soon he was scraping along coarse lime stone.
It was pitch black in this chamber.
As he plummeted feeling the burning of his skin flaking off from the sandy surface of the rock he noticed that the wall he brushed was slowly changing angle.
After a few more seconds he noticed that he was sliding along an decline of perhaps 45 percent and the rock was still leveling out.
He had just enough time to wonder if he would get lucky when his feet struck a large stone causing him to flip over and land on his face.
He rolled over and felt himself slide to a stop.
"Anything broken?" he thought.
"All systems in pain, but operational," replied another part of his mind.
Looking around he realized there was no algae.
"How am I going to get out of here?" Rishi thought.
Rishi chuckled, "Bob," he thought. "His name is Bob."
The first of the two remaining openings were small and each was roughly 15% mapped by Rishi. But he didn't know that because he didn't know how big the caves were. Rishi had spend most of his time on the left cave because it felt as if it lead in the general of the 1000 meter chamber. Rishi had made a mistake: the left cave system was considerably larger than the right cave, but would not lead to the 1000 meter chamber. Bob had never entered these caves, but knew where each could lead.
"He wants to keep me busy huh?" Thought Rishi.
Rishi pointed to the left cave and said, "Eeenie meenie miney moe," changing the cave at which he pointed with each syllable he spoke. "catch a rishi by his toe, if he hollers let him go. Eenie meenie miney moe."
His finger rested now on the right cave, as he knew it would, so he knelt down, squashed himself flat and squeezed into the narrow and low corridor. For almost 100 meters, this tunnel was just big enough for him to get through. There it opened again into a four door chamber of possibilities.
Rishi had explored three of the four caves. He had not found the end of any of them but today was special. It marked the first day of his third year at the cave and he had saved this new tunnel for today.
He had stood up long enough to stretch and then squashed himself sideways into the tall narrow slit which was made when the stone cracked and separated. His geologist mind told him this crack was new, certainly less than a thousand years old. It was actually less than thirty years old.
As he squeezed down the cave it became more and more narrow. To the extent that he was unsure if he could continue forward without risking being stuck or not being able to get out again. He decided to go forward anyway.
He attempted to place his sideways foot farther on the path but found to his surprise that there was no floor. He had come to a precipice.
He was very wedged into that rock but he felt himself lose his balance and start to sway toward the bottomless crevasse. He attempted to put his foot back up and catch himself but there was no way to bend it to accomplish that task. He attempted to grab hold of the stone but his hands could not get leverage without the ability to bend an elbow out.
Rishi slowly slid off the edge of the precipice. As he fell the slit widened and he began a free fall.
"Well. I guess that's it," thought Rishi, "time for me to check out. You'd think Bob would have seen this coming. Perhaps he did..."
Rishi began accelerating downward into near total darkness. This cave had little or no algae which explained why he couldn't see the ledge he fell from.
For a few seconds he scraped the wall but then he felt a room open up around him.
"How far would he fall?" He thought to himself.
At that moment he felt smooth stone brush him from the left. He found himself rolling onto it until his back was downward against the surface.
The smoothness didn't last and soon he was scraping along coarse lime stone.
It was pitch black in this chamber.
As he plummeted feeling the burning of his skin flaking off from the sandy surface of the rock he noticed that the wall he brushed was slowly changing angle.
After a few more seconds he noticed that he was sliding along an decline of perhaps 45 percent and the rock was still leveling out.
He had just enough time to wonder if he would get lucky when his feet struck a large stone causing him to flip over and land on his face.
He rolled over and felt himself slide to a stop.
"Anything broken?" he thought.
"All systems in pain, but operational," replied another part of his mind.
Looking around he realized there was no algae.
"How am I going to get out of here?" Rishi thought.
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