A few weeks ago, I joined a website/Adventure Club called Extreme Things. Saturday. Erika and I joined them for a Mine Cave Exploration Hike in Altadena. Everyone seemed very friendly and we had a good time. Part of the fun for me was the hike, it involved a lot more climbing than I anticipated. Climbing is always a plus. We visited three mine caves, but I only ventured in to the second two. The first involved squeezing through a tight twenty foot crawl space. In essence, I would have only been able to use my feet to push myself through. I crawled through the ample entrance, the walls moving closer steadily. As I reached the point where my shoulders pressed against the rock and my movement became constricted, my heart began to race. I’ve always suffered from claustrophobia and Saturday wasn’t the day I would defeat it. Erika was tougher than me and squeezed inside, as did most of the group. There were two other cowards besides myself. I intend to visit the caves again and eventually force my way inside this particular cave, but it may take multiple attempts. The other two caves were much more spacious. The pictures are misleading, these caves are dark. Without a flashlight, you can see nothing, pure darkness. At some point, groups of gold-seekers dug these caves by hand and/or dynamite. They are rather large when one considers that, each a few hundred feet deep with two or three forks and various alcoves.
