Life in JT's World

This past week certainly was a busy one for Life in JT’s World. There were two baseball games with a Spelunking adventure thrown in between for fun. Combine that with the semi-annual High Point Furniture Market and you have quite a week.

Let’s recap all of the excitement:

Thursday: Night Baseball Game Against the Reds
The Reds are the best team in the 14 team Triad MSBL baseball league. They had the best record in the league last year and they recruited more players for this year’s version. We played in the wonderful Stoner White Stadium, but that did not change the outcome. I went 0 – 3 at the plate, hitting into 3 ground outs. The highlight was that I pitched 2 scoreless innings of relief and struck out 2 batters.

Friday – Sunday: Boy Scout Campout to Lost World Caverns in WV.
We got on the Troop bus around 6:00 pm and arrived at the campsite in WV sometime after 11:00 pm. We set up camp and were in bed just before 1:00 AM. Around 28 of us in all were camping on this trip

At 7:00 AM we got up and prepared breakfast. J.T. was his patrol’s cook for the weekend, meaning that he had to cook for 7 boys counting himself. He made very good Ham and Cheese Omelets for that breakfast.

Around 9:30 am we got back on the bus for the 20 minute ride to the Lost World caverns. ( http://www.lostworldcaverns.com/ ). After we arrived, we got our initial briefing and put on our Spelunking equipment: gloves, kneepads, and hardhat with headlamps. They took a “before” picture of the group in case we didn’t all make it back from the adventure.

We headed into the caverns around 11:00 am for our 4 plus hour, underground adventure. The first part of the tour we followed the normal tour path, viewing the Stalactites and Stalagmites and other interesting formations. Then our guides told us to cross over the railing and follow them. This is where it got interesting. For the next 4 hours and 3 ½ miles we walked, climbed, crawled, slid, and shimmied our way through the caverns. It was an amazing experience. There was one section that lasted about 100 yards where the ceiling was probably no more than 2 – 2 ½ ft high. I had to lay out flat and pull myself along with my arms. James did great and usually was the first person in line behind the lead guide during our trek.

There were areas with names like “The Sewer”, “The Drain”, & “The Birth Canal”. This was not for the faint of heart by any means.

I decided to pass on “The Birth Canal”, so I was rewarded with another football field length arm pull on the alternate route.

Everyone made it out successfully and had a good time. It was quite a work out. You could not believe how muddy the kids were at the end of it all. I just threw my clothes away, since washing them would have been a lost cause anyway.

The Guides (3 in all) took pictures of us during the tour and will send them to us on a CD in a couple of weeks. I will post some then.

The rest of the campout was rather uneventful after that. James cooked another great meal for his patrol and we packed up on Sunday Morning and returned back home.

Sunday Night: Baseball Game.
After resting for a couple hours, it was time to play a night baseball game. This game was against the Orioles. Although we played them closely, we lost again. This time I was 2 – 3 hitting, with 2 rbi’s. This brought my batting average back up to 0.500 for the season. I also pitched in relief again. I pitched 3 innings this time. The first 2 were scoreless, but after some errors they score a few runs in the last inning I pitched.

All in all it was a very good week. Now all I have to do is great ready for this coming weekend’s 5K run with Madison.