Fleeting Moment Collections

We began our trek through the forest, and when I say trek, I really mean trek. We were walking through knee-high mud and climbing down cliffs on bamboo ladders. We paused for a spiritual introduction to the symbolism behind the cave and our guides used natural plant paint that looked like mud, to draw the symbols on our faces. We eventually made it to Millennium Caves and via methods of rock climbing, swimming, abseiling and a lot of stumbling. It was visually stunning in the cave, and I was in absolute awe at the magnificence of this landmark. There were bats everywhere, but they seemed to scared to get close to me, must have been my symbolic face paint. At times, the water was up to my armpits, other times I had to swim because I couldn’t touch the ground. The roof off the cave went from being so high I couldn’t see the top, to so close I could touch it with my hands. The trek through the cave took 45minutes and then all of a sudden we were out the other side into sunlight again! Next we were off down the river canyoning! We had black tubes to sit in and float down the river, and I lay floating peacefully down the river basking in the beauty of the Vanuatu forest surrounding me, enjoying the sunlight touching my skin and trying to take in every detail so I could remember it for years to come. The river all of a sudden disappeared underground beneath rocks so we began climbing over, under, around, and through rock spaces in order to reach the again. It wasn’t easygoing, I can tell you that, but being a crazy adventurer, I loved every second,! We jumped off a 10 metre high rock down into the roaring river below, which was becoming more like a deep ravine. The sides of the river went up 20metres each side and there were waterfalls rushing off the top of the river banks and gushing 20metres down into the river where we were floating. The way the river caught the sunlight and the waterfalls sparkled as they fell was magical. I looked around me and came across hundreds of fish swimming everywhere, their scales shined in the sunlight and they brushed against my legs if I remained as still as possible. It felt like I was in some sort of Pirates of the Caribbean movie! We floated down the river for about 2hours and then climbed up the 20metre cliff on another one of those precarious bamboo ladders. Upon reaching the top of the cliff we made the long trek back to the village where our mini-van was parked.