The Ice Caves

This has been my favorite trip we've done this semester so far-maybe even better then Bear World! About a week ago, we mentioned to our friends that we were going to try to go to the ice caves this weekend. Luckily for us, one of them knew exactly where to go, and they all said they would love to make the trip with us! So Saturday morning, after meeting up at our place for breakfast, we headed out. After about 45 min or so of driving, we all parked our cars, and then a majority of us hopped in the back of our truck for some light off roading. Our friend Eric drove, since he knew where we were going and had more experience with this sorta thing. Even the ride up there was super fun, while we all talked, laughed, and bounced around in the back hitting a few mud puddles and what not.

Once we reached out final destination, I was amazed looking down into this huge canyon full of rocks to see the entrance to our cave, quite low. From here on out, it was a BLAST. There were parts with climbing, sliding, crawling, you name it, we did it! The most amazing part was that it was all literally surrounded by ice, both above and below us. For me, this was a complete first. I felt like I was in a mix of the movies Ice Age, Jurassic Park, and Star Wars. It was just all so unreal to think that this world has so many natural beauties I'd heard of, but not ever seen. They were worlds better in reality. In the end, when we climbed out way back through the caves, we made our way back to the surface and rested and tried to cool down since it was so much hotter outside.

After heading back, we all went to our homes and saw each other again that night at our Stake Conference [which is a church meeting for those reading who don't know] and most of us picked up some G's Dairy. In talking, one of the girls mentioned how with our little group, it never gets old hanging out with each other-we do it again and again and it is always so fun and we never get tired of it. I think she's right. Now that we are all scattered and not in the same complex anymore, it would be easy to lose touch since its less convenient. But we are so lucky that we have friendships that last, and that we genuinely enjoy each other. I think to have an entire group like that can be rare. I am so lucky to have the friends any experiences I do!

Anywho, this is way longer then I intended it to be b/c I have a million pictures I wanted to share [courtesy of our AWESOME photographer friend Emil]. I am just so glad that we are making the time to enjoy and experience Idaho in ways we never have before! It is like a whole new world.

PS: [After uploading bazillion pics, I realized I put them in exact opposite order! So remember that your gonna start with the pictures of us LEAVING the cave, and end with the ones of us driving to it. I'm not technologically savvy enough to figure out how to switch them in the right order, and I'm to impatient to try to redo it in the right order. Still-they are amazing so enjoy!]

[I just thought this picture was cool-you probably noticed were wearing head lamps b/c its pitch black in the caves, so this is what we saw on our way out...doesn't light just make everything so much better? haha!]

[if you look in the very bottom of this picture you can start to see the entrance to the caves..]

[This is the group that was heading in before us-we didn't bring helmets which Lester and I both have bruises to prove on our heads HAHA!]

[can I just mention how much I love this picture? We were hitting a big bump and so I naturally rammed my arms up against the poor girls so they wouldn't go flying and their faces are priceless! Good times!]