This evening and early morning, we went on an adventure to see an underwater cave. We walked down into the cave mouth then swam a little ways in, when we came to a sump (i.e. a passage in a cave that is submerged underwater). It was not a very long sump. We had to hold our breathe for 5 to 10 seconds to get the the area of the cave we spent the majority of our time. When in the main cave, we just dove down a little ways to look around. It was so cool looking at the stalagmites and stalactites underwater. We also went through the halocline, which is a point where the water changes salinity rapidly. If you stuck your tongue out you could taste the saltiness, especially since this was a freshwater cave. After exploring the cave a little bit, we sat in the complete darkness. We were trying to see if we could catch a glimpse of cave shrimp. The shrimp come out when it is completely dark, so they tend to crawl on you. So, if we felt something crawling on us, we would turn on the light to see if we could see the shrimp. However, we did not get to see any cave shrimp.
This was a really fun trip and I am glad that my friend, Brian, took us. He had explored the cave before with the residence hall manager, so he knew what to expect and wanted to share it with us all.
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