Return To Kentucky

I was excited to finally be returning to Kentucky, after more than a year since I moved away.  On the evening of July 15 I was able to get a seat on a Horizon flight to Seattle.  From there, I was flying U.S. Airways.  It took a while to make my way to the A terminal, but I was able to get a seat on the "red-eye" flight out to Charlotte, NC.  There were plenty of open seats and I had no problem getting on board.  I arrived in Charlotte bright and early, and I was able to catch the first morning flight to Lexington, KY.  It too was wide open and I had no problem getting a seat.

Brandon was picking me up in Lexington, so I had to wait a bit.  He got out of class late, but finally, around noon, he showed up and took me back to his place in Richmond.  We went to Arby's for lunch, and then just hung around his place until he had some friends come over in the evening.  We grilled burgers, talked, and watched some funny videos the whole time.  After even left, Sarah went to bed and Brandon and I stayed up watching a Halo movie until I fell asleep.

The next morning Brandon and I went down to Berea and visited our old friends at the Grounds Crew.  Unfortunately the boss, Matt, wasn't there, but we saw some of the other guys we worked with.  It was a surprise for them to see us.  After that Brandon and I hung out with Ben and Critter for a while.  After that, Brandon left and I heard that Brittany (who I worked with at the Creation Museum) was in town.  So I got to see her, and then I went down to Jacob and Carla's apartment.  I was staying the night with them, and I was taking them and Jacob's sister, Lydia, out for dinner.  We went to a pretty good pizza place in town.

Afterwards Ben and Critter joined Lydia and I.  We played basketball for a while, and I got my butt kicked.  Then the four of us went to Walmart.  Lydia and I had agreed we would have an Ale 8 date, and try to find some Twinkies.  But we only got the Ale 8.  We sat out in the field watching fireflies and drinking the delicious Ale 8, until Lydia brought me back over to Jacob's.  We talked for a while, until Jacob and Carla got back from a walk.

Thursday morning I was up early, and got a ride up to campus where I was meeting Jon to go caving.  It was going to be an awesome day!  Jon and I were going to go do Sinks of the Roundstone Pit in the morning.  It's a 120 foot vertical shaft, with a small amount of cave extending beyond.  After that, Brandon and Critter, and my old caving friend Chris were going to meet us and we were going to do some exploring in Mullins Spring Cave.

Jon and I hiked up to the pit entrance, and worked on rigging the rope, and putting on all our rope gear.

I descended the pit first.  It was nerve-wracking at first, but once I was on my way down it was so much fun.

Once Jon descended he led me as far as you could go through the cave.  There was a little bit of free climbing down, and then some winding passage carved out by the water.  When we reached the end we turned around, and rested at the bottom of the pit.  Then I ascended first.  It wasn't too bad of a workout going the 120 feet up.  You had to push the fear from your mind thinking that your life depended on a small rope.

We went back to the gas station near the Interstate exit and waited for Brandon and Critter.  When they arrived we made the drive to Mullins Spring Cave.

The "plan" was to go explore the dry areas of the cave, and then Chris thought he remembered the really deep water connection passage to get to the main part of the cave.  However, as soon as we entered Chris led Brandon and Critter off to another part of the cave.  Jon followed me.  We explored some passages I knew, and even found others.  Jon and I climbed down to a  pit that had a waterfall, I had always believed a small passage shooting off from it ended.  However, we climbed up the wall and through a little hole we found it went.  Jon remembered it being connected to the "Violation entrance" (another connection made to the Mullins spring cave system).  It was nice figuring this out.

After a while we backtracked and tried to find the others.  We eventually did. They had spent a lot of time in the water.  They took us back to a dome and waterfall they had found, and then I found a small hole that I challenged people to squeeze through.  Jon and I tried, and both made it.  Brandon couldn't fit.

At this point, we were tired and cold, so we decided to head out... The very wet entrance, of course.  It was deep, and cold.

We changed, parted ways, and I went with Brandon back up to Richmond.  We hung out and played games until I went to bed.  It was a great day of caving.

The next day Brandon took me to the Lexington Airport.  A flight was cancelled, and things went downhill.  So I spent $200 and bought the last seat on a Lexington to Charlotte flight, and then Charlotte to Atlanta.  I had to spend a long cold night in Atlanta, before I used (thankfully I had them) my credits with Southwest Airlines to buy tickets to go to Denver, and then back to Boise.  Next time I'll be a little more careful about my planning for flying standby.  It didn't help I wasn't eligible for some of the airlines to get passes yet.

But overall it was a great, exhausting, trip back to Kentucky.  I loved every day of it and I can't wait to go back. :)