Light in the Midst of the Tunnel

I ended up not going to San Pedro, and i think it was for the best. It would have been over a twenty hour bus ride there and back. And two of my five vacation days would have been spent traveling. Instead, Daniel, Holly, and I went camping in a valley about thirty minutes walk form our town. We brought flashlights (British call them torches) and explored a few hundred yards of the cave close to were we set camp.

Instead of being conic, this cavern is most like a long tunnel with one to three foot of murky water to walk through. At a few point we had to crouch or contort our bodies to get through, but the space was traversable the entire time we explored. We eventually turned back when Holly was fed up with the rat feces and Daniel stepped on something large and squishy which made him suddenly concerned of radon poisoning. A few times on the way back out we turned off our lights and just stood in the darkness. There was no light, just the smell of earth and the sound of water moving over our feet. For those few moments there was so much peace.

At our campsite we could hear the stream that ran into the cave. Holly had the foresight to have us buy some food before we left. Daniel and I just wanted to “wing it”. We bought potatoes, eggs, bread, onions, potatoes, and chicken, all of which cost less than six dollars. We kind of invented some cooking techniques using aluminum plates, hot rocks, and a metal grate. We ended up cooking some very interesting and tasty meals.

The night came so quickly, as it does in the valley. We must have spent two hours and five logs around the campfire telling a collaborative ghost story that still gives me the chills. In my foolishness, I didn’t bring pants because we’ve been having really warm nights. But because it was an unusually cold spring night, and because we were still haunted by our story, and because it hard to sleep when the sky is so bright, we laid awake spotting shooting stars and satellites streaking through southern constellations. It was the first time I had seen the stars begin to disappear as the sky pails into sun rise since I’ve been here. I forgot how alive it makes me feel.
God bless.