Spelunking anyone?

   The weather is fluctuating a lot these days.  Some really nice days with temps in the high 50's and 60's but then it can drop quick and get cold fast.  So we took advantage of one such day and went caving also called spelunking.
  This hike to the cave which is along the river is pretty rough hike.  Not for the faint of heart.  It took us almost an hour to get to "bat" cave.  (I say that loosely as I think all caves that don't have another official name are called bat cave)
   We've done this hike twice now and in the spring thaw it was even more of a challenge not to slip all they way down the hill to the river on the mud. But well worth it.

 It's hard to show the steepness of the hill in pictures but we were almost on all fours at times.

Crawling to climbing! Sassafras was being her sassy self.. but I did take a picture of her backside so I guess I'll let her slide :)

See the river in the background.  It amazes me how it is a different world with each season.  In the summer with the trees in full leaves and grown up you can't see that far in the forest.  That made finding our way easier plus fewer scratches and bugs was a nice feature too.

Drink anyone?

Okay, so this is from the 1st hike this summer... But it is a neat spot on the way. Below is Uncle Monkey climbing down the tree that's behind us.

And finally......

This cave has a huge opening but narrows and get short very fast.

This is as far back as we went.  It continues to get shorter and really crawling deeper into the dark didn't appeal to me.  But this summer we found some unique cave life..

 There is evidence of bats and we also found lots of crickets which I'm sure these guys feast on.

Doesn't this look like a mini city or maybe wind chimes?  It's a mud daubers home.. A type of wasp that make homes out of mud. Hence the name :)

 Sugar Bug was brave enough to climb into this mini cave to take pictures of the mud dauber house... Although thankfully they aren't active this time of year.

Spring is right around the corner.. Everyday I hear more birds in the trees, the sun is rising earlier and setting a little later.  Soon the trees will be budding and we will be out hiking even more.. We are anxious to take up our mushroom hunting as spring is the time for the highly prized Morales....mmmm