Spelunking The Banana Caves

 

So we were going to be spelunkers

Speleologists

That’s potholers, in case you were wondering

There were three of us

Me, Sando and Lawley

Would be cave dwellers

Troglodytes

A trio of trogs

We saw this adventure as our initiation test

A coming of age, for three ten year old lads

Spelunking the banana caves

 

We’d got all the equipment we could have hoped for

Climbing rope….

A washing line…Provided by Lawley

His mum wouldn’t miss it

The muckey bugger never did any washing

Two candles

Really one candle

Cut in half

With a wick at each end

And a box of matches

All the equipment you could possibly need

For spelunking

 

The temperature dropped

As we entered the top cave of the vast cavern system

“Two overcoats colder” as my dad would have said

I shuddered

I only had a T-shirt on

My spelunking T-shirt

 

We stared into the abyss

Down the steep shaft

The steep chasm

Into which we were going to descend

 

The banana caves had two entrances

An entrance and an exit, strictly speaking

And we went in through the top entrance

The two caves were separated by a steep vertical shaft

This shaft had a gentle curve to it

Giving the caves their local name

The banana caves

Just right for spelunking

 

I shouted into the chasm

Expecting to hear an echo

And was disappointed when I heard nowt

You couldn’t gauge how deep it fell

Just looking at it

But we weren’t scared

We were spelunkers

 

“Get the rope tied off”

We instructed Lawley

He looked for something to tie it to, inside the cave

And found nowt

Eventually he tied it to a tree stump

Some distance outside the cave

And reeled it in

It didn’t even reach the top of the void

Chuffin’ useless

Lawley was a pillock

 

We considered tying oursens together

With the rope

Alpine style

Bet that wasn’t necessary

We weren’t scared

We were spelunkers

 

We lit both candles

And decided the running order

First Sando… with a candle

Second Lawley without a candle

And lastly me.. with a candle

If we stuck closely enough together

Lawley could see by the light of ours

Plus he had the advantage of having both hands free

So into the abyss we plunged

Three ten year old spelunkers

 

We engaged a method, that we knew as chimney climbing

We wedged oursens into the crack in the rock

With our backs against one side

And the balls of our feet firmly placed on the other side

Then we gently edged our backs down a few inches

Followed by our feet… one after the other

Then the process was repeated

Progress was slow

Especially holding a candle

Lawley definitely had the advantage

With him having an extra free hand

 

Inch by inch we descended into the deep dark chasm

Eventually

We got to the point where we could see neither top nor bottom

Now we really were spelunkers

 

The air inside was stale and dank

And there was no draft

So there was no explanation why

Sando’s candle should have gone out

With a wet sizzling flicker

But it did

 

Now he had become nothing but a shadowy outline

I could barely see him by the light of my dim candle

If truth be known

I could hardly see Lawley either

Poised between us

His back against one side of the void

And his feet firmly planted on the other

 

“Never mind”… I said

Passing Lawley my candle

“Relight his using mine”

I didn’t allow for Lawley’s lack of intelligence

He turned my candle upside-down

Over the extinguished candle

Thus extinguishing both

Now we were in total darkness

We couldn’t see our hands in front of our faces

Not that we dared put our hands in front of our faces

I virtually dug my fingernails into the hard rock

For extra purchase

The worst thing you can do when you’re a spelunker is panic

I wasn’t sure I was a spelunker now

 

We still had the matches remember

I passed them to Lawley

“Don’t drop ‘em”

And he opened the box to get one out

“It’s not my fault” he said

“It’s dark in here”

“How was I to know the box was upside-down?”

Now we had two extinguished candles

And no means by which to light them

Lawley was a pillock

 

I didn’t want to be a spelunker now

I wanted mi mam

 

It was black

Pitch black

And we were frightened that we were going to die

I was sure we were going to die

It’s surprising how quickly I accepted the fact

That we were going to die

In that dank stinky hole

 

But what I couldn’t bare was the fact that

No-one would find our bodies

I pictured us rotting there in that hell-hole

While people on the outside wondered where we were

And sent out a search party

 

None of us had told anyone where we were going

 

The first rule of spelunking

Is to let someone know where you are

And what time to expect you back

We hadn’t thought of that one

I don’t think we were very good spelunkers

 

Decisions… decisions

Do we go back up

Or continue making our way down

We weren’t sure if we’d gone past half way yet

But decided to continue going down

 

Progress was even slower now

In the darkness

We had been moving a few inches at a time

Now the increments had been decreased to half an inch

 

We hardly dared move at all

For fear of falling into the abyss

 

It felt like hours

But probably was a lot less

When Sando called out

“I’ve found solid ground”

“Have you reached the bottom?”

“I don’t know”

“I can see chuff all”

Obviously

 

Within time

We all reached the flat surface

And it felt great to be able to stand upright

We didn’t know if it was the bottom

Or if we’d found a ledge

 

“Right” said Sando

“We need to find the matches”

With that

The cave was immediately filled with light

“What’s that” we asked

“Mi torch” said Lawley

“So.. you had the torch all along?”

“Why didn’t you say earlier?”

“No-one asked”

Lawley was a pillock