To A Recently Discovered Cave
I woke up at five o’clock in the morning because I had a plan to go to a recently discovered cave. A total of six people, my dad, and his colleagues and I started our trip at 6 AM.
Darkness slowly faded away and our surroundings became clearer and clearer. To the left and right stretched vast paddy fields, their green expanse unfolding under the waking sky. Ahead lay a highway, where a handful of cyclists pedaled along the open road. When you looked afar, there were chains of mountains covered by mist. And, a small ball which emits a golden red color is emerging from a slightly grey sky. It was like watching a painting. For me who is not an early bird but a night owl, witnessing the sunrise gave me a fresh and wonderful feeling.
We had breakfast in a shop on the road. We had to wait for about an hour and a half in a town because two girls who wanted to come along with us were beautifying themselves. After three and a half hours, we reached a village where we met a young girl who would be our guide. The guide asked us to have lunch at her house but we refused because we were late and continued the trip. Although she came with us as a guide, she also had never been to the cave but she is a local and knows the area.
We often found ourselves lost, uncertain of our next step, deep within the forest. The majority of the trees bore dry, brown leaves, though a few clung to green or flashed with red—yet brown dominated. The heat was oppressive, amplifying the earthy monotony around us. It stirred a strange yearning in us, a longing for something undefined. Certain landscapes can evoke such tangled emotions, and this was no exception.
The road turned out to be terrible. It was a narrow, dusty, and uneven stretch littered with rocks, forcing the car to struggle up a steep hill. Our vehicle, with its low ground clearance, couldn’t handle it, so we had to get out and walk. Before long, we encountered another car attempting to descend the hill, and the two vehicles came to a deadlock. Given the situation, the descending car had no choice but to reverse—behind our car was another one traveling with us, and beyond that, a cliff loomed. But when the downhill car tried to back up, it inexplicably rolled forward instead. It tried again, only to lurch forward once more, nearly crashing into ours. I don’t know how the drivers felt, but watching from the sidelines, my nerves were on edge. Fortunately, the car finally managed to reverse successfully, allowing ours to pass. It was a close call, but we breathed a collective sigh of relief once we made it through.
The guide mentioned that the driver attempting to navigate down the hill was a novice who recently started driving—something that was painfully clear. My dad, on the other hand, was behind the wheel of the first car inching up the hill. He admitted his knees were trembling, and as a precaution, he cranked the steering wheel hard in the opposite direction, ready to veer off if things went south. It was a tense, risky moment, and it hit me that venturing through a wild forest is far from a walk in the park.
The cars were moving on a mountain road. The guide told us to look at our skin color. I thought, “Is there something wrong with it?” and when I looked at my skin, it was greenish-yellow. I was surprised. The guide explained that we were on a mountain called “A mountain which changes colors” if you translated it directly. As its name suggests, the colors on the mountain are somehow changed. The ground turned into a color of sunrise, a mix of orange and red. Brown skin turned into yellow and white skin turned into greenish-yellow. As for the reason, nobody knows why. If it were just the ground’s color that had changed, we might attribute it to PH levels or the presence of certain metals. But our skin colors shifted too. At first, we suspected sunlight might be the culprit, yet our guide dismissed that idea—villagers who ventured up the mountain at night reported the same changes to their skin. Day or night, it seems to make no difference. What a perplexing enigma! I’d never encountered a mountain capable of altering colors in all my life, and now here I was, living it. The sensation was indescribable, stirred by a phenomenon beyond understanding.
The area we were in was pretty remote, though we did spot a handful of folks. Nearby, there are charcoal mines, and the locals are into farming. I reckon someone who’s cooped up in their room all day and someone living way out in the remote forest are sort of alike, yet not quite. They both only deal with, like, three to six people, and I’d bet both types are weird.
Multiple dry bamboo leaves were falling from the sky. It was like a scene in the movie and it made me feel like a cultivator in a Chinese drama. There exists a cave near the bamboo forest. It is a recently discovered cave we were heading towards and finally, we arrived there. From the village to the cave, it took 6.46 km (4.01 miles).
We descended into an underground cave, plunging into its depths. The darkness was absolute, forcing us to rely on flashlights and the light of our phones to illuminate our surroundings. As we made our way down, the first thing that caught our eyes were stalactites shaped like jagged teeth, reminiscent of the dragon fangs you’d see in anime. Venturing deeper, we were struck with awe. The cave revealed a stunning display of white rocks that sparkled like glitter under the beams of our flashlights. The beauty was breathtaking, a testament to the incredible wonders of nature.
We were moving forward in the darkness. Going into the unknown and invisible provoked fear in me and it gave me an adventurous feeling. Soon, we were wowed again. We saw a large ceiling which is like a tiger’s back. I stared at the ceiling for a while and I was in awe. Again, nature is very splendid and excellent. As we moved forward, it became hotter and hard to breathe because oxygen became less. We reached the end of the cave and we were amazed again. We saw a very wide rocky dead-end wall and it made me feel like my existence is very small. I was literally speechless.
The cave’s rock formations are very diverse. Some resemble waterfalls, gleaming with sparkles, while others, shaped like icicles, which might startle you. Certain formations feature striking crimson streaks, and a few rocks even mimic the softness of cotton. The atmosphere evokes the sensation of being beneath the ocean. If water seeping from the surface above helped in shaping everything here, to have them beautifully shaped, I am sure it took hundreds of years.
I clearly knew that rocks here came in different types, but I never understood what set them apart. I’d only grasped their surface-level differences, and for the first time in my life, I felt a genuine pull to become a geologist. Knowledge gives us the vision to recognize the true worth of things. Without it, I couldn’t appreciate the cave fully. If I’d had even a basic understanding of geology, I might have been able to gauge the cave’s age just by looking at the rocks, right? You will never forget the feelings you received for the first time. The cave is very mythical to me. I was in a mythical world for a few hours.
On our way back home, when I saw vast lands and mountain ranges, I thought about battle formations and generals since I finished watching an anime called Kingdom yesterday. It was imprinted in me and it is a great anime.
The sun was setting. Many trees, their thin dry branches sharp in the dimming light, threw long shadows that drew lines across the ground like a quiet picture. The scene was tranquil yet hollow. Everything I experienced was left behind like it was nothing at all, as if it had never even happened. Just moments ago, it was morning—now darkness had taken hold. The day had raced by too quickly. I was watching another painting with an empty mind on my way home. And, I remembered “Last Train Home”, an ending song of JoJo’s bizarre adventures.
People will modify that cave soon. If possible, I want people to leave it in its original state. But, I know that my wish won’t be granted. Among the seven caves I have been to, when it comes to width, this cave is NO. 1 and when it comes to beauty, this cave is NO. 2.
My 2021 started with an adventure. More adventures are warmly welcome.
Jan 6, 2021
The photos were taken from phone and they have poor resolution.
When LED light met high resolution camera:
