The November outing for the Trex group was an overnight trip to Banff.  On Saturday we took in the Mountain Film Festival and saw films of varying lengths about all kinds of things including extreme sports like BASE jumping, extreme biking and kayaking down waterfalls.  There was a film about the pygmy gorilla from Borneo and one about the lifestyle of a nomadic people in Nepal.  It was a lot of movie watching!

 

On Sunday we travelled to Rat's Nest Cave near Canmore for a caving day.  We ventured down crawling, sliding and rappelling.  We saw interesting cave formations like soda straws and bacon strips.  They were rock formations formed by dripping water.  Quite a few of us took the challenge of traversing the laundry chute, a narrow passage that we had to wiggle through on our bellies.  We all survived to tell the tale but we won't likely all be back.  Later the challenge squeeze was presented to us.  It was even smaller and only a few took it on.

 

At the bottom of the cave there was a beautiful grotto with a small pool.  By the time we got there we were plenty muddy and tired and ready for the climb out into the daylight.  If you turn the lights out it is truly dark in a cave.

 

It had snowed some while we were in the cave and we emerged to a beautiful mountain scene and headed home.