Photo courtesy of Malcolm. So this is one of the “narrow” caves. There’s a story there. Malcolm and I were sort of bringing up the rear of the group, again mostly because I was too busy taking pictures to keep up. And Malcolm, I think, was making sure I actually made it up alive. He’s a really, really nice polite, gracious man (although Imogen might take issue with that comment at “puddings” time…more on that later). Always felt I had someone looking out for me – biking, hiking, whatever we were up to on the trip.
Anyway – we were at the end of the line and we came to the second or third cave we were going to try going through. Gerard would always scope out the cave we’d be entering, make sure it worked and then tell everyone they had the option of going around and he’d hack out some steps to climb around the outside. So – there was this German couple towards the front of the line. They started into the ice cave, and then came back out. The woman passes by me on her way to take the detour, and says, “It’s very, very narrow,” with that tone of voice that implies I shouldn’t even try. I was very insulted. You all know I know I’m overweight, but few people actually just come up and tell you you’re too fat to do something. Of course, I was then determined to get through. Malcolm heard her and asked if I wanted to start to snowball fight…offered to throw out the first pitch. Actually, I’m sure she was just trying to be helpful.
Anyway – I went through all but one of the caves. Did one on my stomach- kind of like a seal sliding around on a slippery rock. There was a small canyon you had to get over, and the stomach seemed to be the way to go. Malcolm got a picture of that too…so maybe he’s not the gentleman I just described 
. It was all very, very FUN! Like playing in the snow when you were a kid. I was very happy to have my rainpants though, because I went through none of them on my feet and would have been soaked through without those pants. At one point, I had to go from sitting to getting a foothold to get out of a cave. The opening was actually into a small crevasse between two caves. Each time I’d get my foot in on one side, go to put the second one in, and would just slide back into the first cave on my butt. After a few tries I just started laughing so hard there was no hope. That’s when Gerard came and gave me hand. And no, Joe, I didn’t do it on purpose…really, I didn’t.