Cave Adventure 8/30/2011

When Brad, a new friend of Ted’s, asked him to go “caving” with him and his two sons last week, Ted jumped at the opportunity.  Ted loves finding new spots on the Island, and Brad, with long-time Island connections, knows places we’ve never even heard of before – much less visited.

Ted and I have explored the popular limestone caves – Skull Cave, Devil’s Kitchen, Cave-in-the-Woods, and Eagle Point Cave (I didn’t actually climb to Eagle Point, but I stood below and gave helpful instructions while Ted did).  When Brad began describing some of the places they were going, I sure was glad this was a “guys only” adventure.  The climbing he was talking about was way out of my comfort zone, but, to be honest, I don’t get nearly as excited about scaling cliffs and bluffs looking for caves as Ted does (I don’t get nearly as excited about football as Ted does either, but that’s another story).

Since Ted took all the photos for this one, except for a couple that Brad shot so Ted could prove he made the trip (smile), I asked him to sit next to me at the computer and caption the pics.  So, here’s the cave story – in Ted’s own words.

"We climbed down the bluff along Leslie Avenue and reached this first cave."

"Looking back up from the first cave toward Leslie Avenue."

"Further down Leslie Avenue, we climbed down to this larger cave."

"Here, we're looking down from the second cave, through the trees, to M-185 - the shoreline road."

"We climbed along the bluff, looking for more caves."

"More exploring."

"From the top of the bluff, we could look toward the Eastern U.P."

"We left Leslie Avenue and turned onto Murray's Trail, where we found another crack in the island. In this particular location, we dropped a rock down into the opening and never heard it hit the bottom."

"This is the same 'crack' - just further down along the trail.

"We left Leslie Avenue, went down Scott's Road, then turned onto Scott's Shoreline Road until we hit M-185 to head back into town. About 1/4 mile east of Arch Rock, we climbed up the side of the bluff to find a third cave Brad knew about."

"Brad has been told if you sit in this spot during a heavy downpour, water comes off the cliff above, and it's like sitting under a waterfall."

"Coming back down the bluff to M-185."

"Looking up along the face of the cliff where the third cave was located."

When Ted got home that day he was one tired guy – tired, but with a great big grin on his face.  He was happy he was able to keep up with Brad and the boys, AND he was happy to have explored some new places on the Island.  Brad’s already told him of another cave he’s heard about they need to see if they can find.  Ted’s ready when he is!

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We’re off to the Soo Tuesday morning and won’t be home until evening.  Jill, bless her heart, is using her day off to house/dog sit for us, so we can leave the island secure in the knowledge the babies are well taken care of.  Keep a good eye on them, Jill – they will try to pull something over on you if you’re not careful – especially that Maddie!