Within another 45 minutes we reached the parking for the trail head. There was LOTS of cars there; however most of them would be gone by the end of the day. Most people went there for a day hike. We took our first break at Big Branch Falls.
We continued on, but we did not take the usual route. Jon said we were going to camp on the Caney Fork Overlook that night. So we took a right, when we came to a fork in the trail. Soon, we were lugging our packs and gear up the steep rocky slopes.
We hiked a little ways away from the main cliff and found a nice spot to make camp for the first night. Jon, Jason, Jacob, and I were in hammocks. Since there was no clouds Jacob and I didn't double bunk ours to share a rain fly.
While some of the guys hiked to the spring on top of the overlook to filter water, the rest of us gathered up firewood and Jon got dinner cooking. He made chili-joes. It was ground turkey mixed with chili, and we ate it on hamburger buns. It was really good; especially after the long day.
We watched the stars for a while, and then went back to our campsite. We fixed banana boats for dessert. You take a banana, slice it in half (with the peel still on) and fill it with mini marshmallows and chocolate chips. Then you close it up, and wrap it in tin foil. You let it cook for a while in the fire. When you are camping, you usually end up going to bed early. That's what we did. I crawled into my hammock and loved it. However, I had to get up 4 times to go water some trees because I drank so much water with my dinner.
Morning came and we all eventually crawled out of our warm sleeping bags and gathered around the fire that Drew got going. We ate our breakfast. My breakfast every morning was a pop tart, and granola bars.
After everybody was up we packed up our campsite and walked the short distance to the cliff Jon had said we'd rappel off. Rather than do the grueling hike down off the overlook again, Jon decided we'd save ourselves some effort and time. He said we would rappel with all our gear. So Jon got the rope set up and he went down first. I was soon to follow. It went fine until I ran out of rock ledge. the majority of the rappel was dangling in the air. With a 40 pound backpack the weight of it pulled you over so you were parallel with the ground.
It was pretty nerve wracking. I kept thinking I was going to flip completely over and end up going down head first. Because of this, I panicked and let go of the rope coming out of my belay that controls your speed, and I grabbed the rope above me. I would have fallen straight down had it not been for the fireman holding onto the bottom of the rope at the base of the cliff. If anything happens, his job is to yank on the rope and it will stop you in place. So I recovered, and got myself back on track, and I continued descending, until I reached the bottom. Needless to say, unless I have to, I'm never going down with a backpack again.
After a while, I hiked back up the top of the cliff. I was going to go down again, but then backed out because of my bad experience with the backpack. I watched Jon go down Auzzie, but finally I went down again. The beginning is always the hard part. Until after you learn back out over the cliff, and take those first couple steps it's torture. But after that it's really fun. And without a backpack I had a blast putting less friction on the rope and zooming down to the bottom.
The rest of us ate lunch, and then took a nap under the cliff, while Jon and Drew ascended the cliff using a rope and knot system (I've been practicing on it, but I'm not ready to try and get past a lip in a cliff).
When they were both done, they did a double rappel (meaning you have two ropes running through your belay). This allowed Jon to undo the rope when he reached the bottom. Then we packed up, and began the hike down to hide our gear. We stopped at Big Laurel Falls for a break, and we looked around a little bit.
The creek flows backwards and gets sucked into an underwater cave system. Jon found a couple sinkholes, though, where water had once flowed. And of course, I was very eager to check them out for him. I got muddy and got some nasty foam on me, but they didn't lead anywhere I could get to. We continued on and Jon said we would see about camping at Virgin Falls. So we continued hiking and went past Sheep Cave Falls, and then finally made it to Virgin Falls.
However, with the cool air flowing from the cave and the waterfall, it was cold, and would have been colder come morning. So Jon decided to hike down to the Caney Fork River. By the time we got there I was beat. I took off my pack and laid on the ground resting. I was really weak and ready for dinner. Even 6,000 calories/day wasn't always enough. But, we got our camp set up and then Jon began preparing dinner. We had Jambalaya.
After dinner it was just mostly sitting around the camp fire talking, and covering up stuff. Jacob had brought his weather radio and the forecast said rain.
Morning came, however, and there had been no rain, to speak of. We ate breakfast, and then split up to do devotions/praying/whatever. When we were done we got our gear together and hiked up to the upper entrance to Virgin Falls Cave.
We had brought along rain gear too, in case it began raining while we were in the cave. We got to the upper entrance, suited up, and then descended into the darkness!
We made pretty good time. Jon led us the route we had taken last time. I remembered a lot of the formations and such.
Then to everyone's amazement I was able to turn myself around and come out headfirst.
We got back to camp and Drew and Jacob decided they wanted to go jump in the river. The river is freezing this time of year, and has lots of water in it. If you stay in long, you're going to get hypothermia. But we were filthy, and stinky, and wanted to freshen up. Eventually, all of us ended up jumping in. But it was more fun because on a large sycamore tree near our campsite some one had tied a rope swing onto a branch. So we flew way out into the river and had to swim back, in shock.
It was a big shock to our bodies, but it felt good. After we had all jumped in, we changed, and Jon got dinner going. We had some type of Italian pasta stuff, and french bread. We sat around the fire talking, and Jon told us the plans for the next day. It would be a free day. Jon and I already knew what we would be doing. It wasn't long and the rain FINALLY came. We scrambled to cover up stuff and then went to bed. The rain went pretty much until late morning.
I ate breakfast in my hammock as I didn't want to get up into the rain. But I finally did, when it let up. We all figured out who was going to do what. Everybody except Daniel was going to go up to Sheep Cave Falls with Jon and I. However, only Jon and I wanted to go explore Upper Sheep Cave. We gathered up lunch items, and our gear and hiked up to the falls. The first place Jon, Jason, and I explored was the lower sinkhole. It was a steep slippery climb down.
We could only get to the bottom and see a small waterfall before the water got sucked into Lower Sheep Cave. During a dry season, you can get into Lower Sheep Cave. When All three of us finally climbed out, we then hiked to Upper Sheep Cave. Jon and I then got suited up.
We got out and were really excited. We changed and then I got some pictures of Sheep Cave Falls. There are essentially two halves to the falls.
Everybody met back up and then we hiked back to camp. At that point I decided to change and then rest in my hammock. Jon and Jason ran off to go explore along the river. It wasn't long, however, when Jon and Jason came back telling me to grab my caving gear. They had discovered a couple resurgences farther down the river. Resurgences are where water comes out of the ground; from an underwater cave. We all grabbed our headlamps and I followed them. We were able to crawl a little ways into them before they became submerged/ and/or too tight to go through. The second one had a deep pool you could jump into, but you would need air tanks to go any further.
We began poking around the rocks and cliffs trying to find other leads, but we didn't. However, when we were climbing around I had an accident. I was trying to lower myself down to a foothold. My balance was off and I fell, hitting the rock on the right side of my rib cage, and then sliding another twenty feet down to the bottom. Thankfully though, I'm pretty sure at this point nothing is broken. I just have bragging rights to the worse injury out of everyone on the trip, and some pretty bruised ribs (And a nice thick, long scab).
The next morning Jacob got a fire going, and I got up and joined him. We sat around the fire talking and eating, before everyone else got up. We ate, and then packed up camp. Before we headed out we took a couple group pictures.
Jon found a really good burger joint a couple miles up the road and we went in. As soon as we walked in, we were the main focus of the place. All the poor girls working the register see is 7 filthy, smelly guys who just walked out of the wilderness, and come in to order some food. We didn't have a clue what to order. We'd been living on granola bars and noodles for 5 days! So Jon ordered first, and to make it go quickly we all ordered the same thing. And of course, not having to filter water, or wash our bowls with sand was nice. The whole meal we made jokes about stuff. We wolfed down our food, and the manager even came out to talk to us.
But, we made it back to Berea fine. Got cleaned up and unpacked. It was a great trip, better than last year. I got to do more caving, spend more time out in the wilderness, try some pretty freaky things and get over my fear of leaning back over cliffs. And I was even able to spend some good time talking with God out where there are no distractions!
Also, here is a link to some short video clips I compiled from the trip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uu-3Nyed4k4
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