Yesterday, my caving class went to Box Canyon in Socorro.  We were practicing our rappelling skills and learning how to climb a little as well.

The original plan was to rappel off a short cliff for a while and then move on to the big 120 foot cliff when we were ready.  Unfortunately, we never made it to the big cliff because these goons hogged it for the whole day.

When we arrived at about noon, they were already there and set up, so we couldn't exactly kick them out.  That would be rude.  They started off rappelling and then moved on to something a little different.  Somehow, they rigged it up so one rope was attached to the right side of the cliff and the other rope was attached to a person.  The person would start from the far end, unclip the second rope and swing back and forth, doing flips in the air and whatnot.  They seemed to know what they were doing, but the stupidest part was none of them wore helmets.  It was a really windy day and winds can go through that canyon super fast.  I would've been afraid of slamming my head into the rocks.

Meanwhile, we all did three rappels off this cliff here.

About 40 feet

Setting up a rappel is complicated business.  First you have to make your anchors, which involves tying a bunch of knots that I always forget how to tie.  Then, you tie your very expensive climbing/caving rope (also with special knots) to the anchors, hook up the rope to your harness, make a backup safety, and slide back.  Seems like a lot of work for less than a minute of rappelling, but it's really fun.  I get nervous every time I do it, though!  Haha!

After we finished rappelling, we tried our hand at climbing for a while.  It's hard!  I've only climbed once before, in grad school, and it was in a gym, which is way easier.  I got stuck for a while but my teacher helped me out by telling me where to put my feet and I finally made it up almost to the top.  Then it started getting a little difficult and I got to rappel down, which goes a lot faster and is a ton more fun when someone else is controlling the rope.

I've pretty much designated myself the class photographer, so I spent my downtime taking pictures of other people climbing.

This is how it's done

At first, I wasn't sure I wanted to go on this field trip, because of the wind, but I ended up having a lot of fun, and it makes me want to go back to try the big cliff sometime.  There's also some cool looking little caves that I'd like to explore as well.