15 Replies to “Things not on my bucket list.”

  1. If you’ve any tendency of claustrophobia, caving is not for you. But there’s another level to it that really gives me the willies, and that is the exploration of underwater caves. Far too many people doing it end up dead.

  2. I’m already passing through the bowels of Kathleen Wynne’s war against the middle class. I don’t see how this could be any worse.

  3. The fact that birth is the leading indicator of death doesn’t matter here. One shouldn’t have to include the word “premature” every time that word is used.
    If you’re smirking after reading that line, you have a dirty mind.

  4. I have doen a fair bit of caving back in the mid80’s: Gargatua near Crosws Nest, Nakamou in rogers Pass and more than 1 trip to Rats nest in Exshaw…which is where a good friend of mine any girlfriends cousin near got trapped underwater exploring (full scuba + pony tanks…going in was fine…but their travels kicked up flour like silt and the way back was totally by feel..sms to rope got caught in a crack..they were on 5 min of air when they finally came up…pretty hairy stuff.
    Caving was fun as well repelling…. saw some pretty incredible stuff inside some of these, particularly Nakamou and Rats nest…But age creeps up, that and a 60′ climbing fall I near did not survive…thank god or someone for the 10″ branch 8′ above ground that broke my fall – that and my helmet…still came out of it with a Compound Femur..both arms-left writs dusted, hip, right ankle, broken jaw and a crushed left heel….other than that I was just fine….LOL
    14 months in Hospital (right leg – femur break), got infected .with a bug only found in the Hospital – of course..Seratia. nasty nasty critter…took near 6 months to get rid of.
    anyway..its all good …no more climbing or caving…only thing I can’t do is ride a bicycle and do “la doggy” style on my knees..but like a good marine, adapt and overcome – we cut the legs to the bed..!
    Whatever works right..??
    Cheers,

  5. As with each and every National Geographic article … it has to ALL come back to Global Warming … even a benign story about a cave in Zurggisstan …
    In the same way that scientists use ice core samples taken from glaciers, they can gather data from speleothems. By analyzing the chemical components delivered to these formations by drip water over millennia, they can get clues to Earth’s climate at various points in time.
    So, I am guessing that some International Global Warmist Funding Institute bestowed a grant to these spelunkers to provide “deep” proof of Global Warming. BTW … I can immediately identify a myriad of arguments as to why analyzing speleothems is a horrically inaccurate proxy for the climate above this mile-deep cave. But then again, I am not consumed with proving the very tenuous hypothesis of AGW to the point of mental illness

  6. Well, as ZeroHedge likes to say, On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero
    What I should have said was that cave divers have a tendency to die in ways that I consider particularly awful.

  7. Reading that story gave me the willies. There is no way I would do anything even close to what they are doing. I felt the same way years ago when I watched that video SDA had of the guy that climbed to the very top of a antenna tower or something with NO safety gear!!. I commented a joke that I had to go lie down on the grass outside cause I was so dizzy after watching that. haha

  8. Worst on-the-job moment of my life was climbing an installed radio tower to verify the POE connection.
    The towers structural supports were too large for the safety harnesses carabeaner (sp?) and so I free-climbed it. I swear I felt every gust and I had a three point contact every single step of the way.
    I am not a fan of heights, at all, and so there were a couple of moments when I just froze.
    Horrifying.

  9. I too did a fair bit of spelunking in my younger more foolish days, logging hundreds of hours underground. The best part was free rappelling into the enormous bell shaped rooms below some sinkholes. In those days of carbide lamps you couldn’t see the walls in the big ones, so you’re sliding down a rope in total darkness and the lights of those already on the bottom look like stars in the sky. Favorite cave for that was Newberry-Banes in Virginia with a 180ft entrance drop. After many hours exploring below, the climb back up that rope was always a good workout in the days before mechanical ascenders, when all we had were prussik knots. Good times; lotsa fun.

  10. “For a minute there I thought you were talking about Rosie O’Donnel.”
    Pardon me while I pray to the porcilen god for an hour or three…

  11. Worst experience tower climbing: being (beeing?) greeted by a swarm of bees, fighting off natural reactions, and waiting for the little bastards to stop stinging.

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