the cave

a couple of weeks ago while i was up in maine, i made the hike up cranberry peak as part of the cache challenges i'd decided to do.

i think i mentioned it to you before, but i will say it again: the trail up to cranberry peak is only three and a quarter miles long, but if you're in good shape you should expect it to take four hours. the terrain is kind of rough.

i had seen some mentions in scattered posts about THE CAVE, but i hadn't seen trail markers or anything that suggested to me it might be on the way to cranberry peak, so i figured it was just a thing i'd have a look at some other time maybe.

but way, way up the mountain up near the moose latrine section of trail there's a little sign that says THE CAVE which is both inviting and, under the trail conditions, a little frightening. i don't know if it's going to be like the debsconeag ice cave, or something more frightening.

i don't even know how far it's going to be.

first look at it

but the trail i marked with a good deal of flagging tape, and i decide there will be no harm in going down at least a little ways just to see.

well!

it's less of a cave and more of a fracture in the rock, but way cool.

come to think of it, with a few feet less snow there might be more cave-iness to it, but all the same i climb up to the ledge, hands and feet,


and i hang around in there for a while.

then it's a jump down into sliding on my butt to the bottom of the ravine and out and up to the trail again.

it is a side trip well worth taking, even alone on a rainy day and by the time i get out of there the clouds are even beginning to clear and the sun is coming out.

view from inside

it flickers briefly across my mind to maybe go back up to the summit to have a look at the view, but that idea is quickly quashed by the knees and my sense of growing fatigue.

this is enough.

it's foggy in here.

view down ledge

sun beginning to show

my tracks, up and down.