On Day 2 of Troop 601 B’s trek with Lenhok’sin High Adventure, Scouts and their leaders got to explore Crossroads Cave!
The cave, which has over 4 miles of surveyed passage, is regarded as one that is great for beginning spelunkers while still being engaging.
After a short drive out to Bath County from Baird Base Camp, the crew geared up with durable clothes, helmets, gloves, and headlamps, and began their descent. They prepared beforehand and learned the importance of maintaining three points of contact at all times and to call out loose rocks or other possible hazards, and most importantly, they reviewed both inside and outside the cave the importance of leaving no trace in the cave.
As Dan Leichtling, the Lenhok’sin Camp Director and the guide for the adventure, noted to the crew, the cave itself is a very static environment, and not much can change down there without human involvement. Once the crew had gotten their fill of the spacious first room, the crew moved to “The Crossroads,” a smaller room that branches off into other rooms in the cave, but the route they followed was one that looped back into the first room!
After a small break in the main room where the Scouts got to explore a small passage, the crew made their way deeper into the cave, getting to a slightly smaller but still spacious room where the crew took a seat and got to experience total cave darkness. After a fun demonstration showing how breaking mints in your mouth can lead to some visible sparks in the darkness, once the lights came back on the Scouts and some leaders successfully crawled through the “Mole Hole,” a rather narrow passage that they had to lay flat on the ground and maneuver through. The crew also took some time to see the Fossil Room, a small room with a wall covered in old fossils from when the cave was underwater. Below the room is a visible drop into “The Maze,” a large system of passages in the cave that wasn’t explored by the crew this time around.
Once that was explored, the crew decided to head back to the main area to wrap up, but not before stopping by the Five Foot Ledge, the only way in and out of The Maze.
After another crawl through of a small passageway, the crew found itself back in the main room, where they began our ascent back to the surface! The Scouts and leaders had a choice of entering the way they came in or going up a similar but slightly more challenging way back up. Once they got back to the surface and were hit by the strong temperature difference (it was about 50 degrees in the cave and almost 90 outside it!), the crew headed back to Baird Base Camp to clean up and prepare for dinner.
While still challenging for everyone, the cave proved to be an amazing time, and added another level of adventure and challenge for the Scouts as they work on their trek this week!
