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Caving on Vancouver Island
Nancy Moelaert at Maiden Grace Waterfall
Photo by Nancy Moelaert
Cave entrance at White River
Photo by Nancy Moelaert
Just mention the word cave and many people think of tight cramped spaces where you can't turn around, you can't go forward and you can't go back. It's so tight you can hardly breathe. Nightmare material for most of us but not for Nancy Moelaert, "when I’m in a cave I’m more afraid of falling than of getting stuck. Exploring caves means that a lot of the time you’re using mountain climbing techniques to climb down into the cave sometimes to incredible depths.” And what does "incredible depths” mean exactly? Nancy laughs, "The deepest we’ve rappelled into was a ninety meter pit. When we dropped a pebble into the opening it took seventeen seconds before it hit the bottom.”
According to the Wikipedia online encyclopaedia there are virtually thousands of caves on Vancouver Island many of them completely unexplored and doubtless many as yet undiscovered. Nancy, her husband Trevor and their caving club "The Underachievers” have come to Vancouver Island intent on exploring one of the planets last frontiers, the caves and passages beneath our feet.
Like most sports caving has its’ own language and an important term to know is "squeeze". Of course, it means any tight passage or opening. In The Underachievers, however, a squeeze is known as a nancy. Weighing in at 120 lbs and a little over 5 feet tall Nancy is the smallest member of her team and that means if she goes into a passage no wider than she is and gets stuck her team-mates are all too big to crawl in after her. And just how tight is tight? Nancy describes what it’s like climbing out of a nancy, "It sounds strange to say it but it feels like I’m being reborn, like I’m coming out of the womb of Mother Earth."
Nancy says she has always been up for adventure. Her eyes twinkle as she speaks, "When you’re caving there is a discovery around every corner." And adventure comes in many forms. "In one squeeze I was pushing my way through and over my shoulder I saw a "daddy long legs". I didn’t think anything of it. I am not particularly afraid of spiders but then I saw more and more and right behind me was a huge ball of spiders. There were thousands. It's the only time I have screamed in a cave and it's not something I would recommend you do".
Nancy and her husband have always caved together and she remembers when caving became their sport of choice, "It was in 1994 we were climbing glaciers on the mainland and we just felt we weren't getting much out of it for the work we were putting into it. Climbing up a crevice you’re mainly concerned with getting to the top there’s not much to see on along the way. Caves are different there’s always the unexpected. One summer just for something different we went on a cave tour. We both loved it and that’s when we started caving seriously". And when Nancy says she’s serious she can easily back up her claim as a member of BC Cave Rescue, a Cave Rescue instructor and a member of Search and Rescue she has the skills needed for survival in difficult situations. But wait she is not through yet. She tops it off as an accomplished yoga instructor teaching five classes a week of Kripalu yoga. Not surprisingly Kripalu yoga is a strength building discipline as well as a relaxation technique.
At first it seems an unlikely combination caving and yoga but as Nancy describes it, "Yoga is very calming and stabilizing. In yoga we call it grounding. In caving and yoga it’s the connection with the earth that’s fundamental. Actually my most profound meditation was in a cave. I was sitting on a narrow ledge directly above a fifty foot drop, I took off my climbing gear, turned off my light and just listened to the complete and utter silence."
Nancy started yoga classes to mitigate the physical injuries of an active sports life. The side benefits were a pleasant surprise. Previously a staunch perfectionist, she says that learning not to sweat the little stuff made a huge difference in her quality of life. "I was actually creating my own stress without knowing it." Dealing with stress by learning relaxation and developing strength has served Nancy well. "I want to pass on what I have learned by creating an atmosphere of compassion and surrender in my classes." The eight hours a day physical training at Trinity Yoga Centre was not the hardest part of learning to teach yoga as Nancy reports "it was emotionally as well as physically demanding. Our instructors emphasized emotional as well as physical health and we were encouraged to deal with our emotional issues as well as challenging ourselves physically."
Unlike yoga caving can be dangerous and many cavers have stories to tell. Recently the television series "Storm Warning" dramatized Nancy's incredible story of underground survival. In 2000 on the north coast of Vancouver Island a storm blew in off the Pacific and the torrential downpour trapped Nancy, Trevor and Nancy’s brother Bruce at the bottom of a one hundred foot drop five hundred feet from the mouth of Arch cave. The massive runoff from the storm flooded into the cave making escape impossible. "There was so much water coming over the cliff it was like trying to stand under a hundred foot waterfall" Nancy explained it was then that she got the biggest scare of her caving career, "Trevor thought that he still might be able to find a way through the water so he started to climb the rope". When he got near the top Nancy held her breath,"he stopped climbing and his legs were just dangling and he wasn’t moving. But I wasn't scared until my brother put his arm around me. I just kept saying in my head, no, this couldn't be happening."
Well, it didn’t happen and Nancy and Trevor are still with us living on Vancouver Island and enjoying their 30 years together. Nancy sums it up"This is going to sound strange but the best part of caving is getting out of the cave. Caving is always an adventure but like when you come home from a holiday you might have had a great time but it's just good to get home. That's what it's like when you come out of a cave. The air is fresh, the light is bright, it's warm and it just feels good to be outside."
