Friday, September 14, 2012


On Saturday, Sept 1st,  eight hikers went to Buggytop Cave just south of Sewanee in Carter State natural Area.  Rain threatened all day, but it never materialized.  We had plenty of cloud cover though, which made for cooler hiking on a humid Tennessee day.  After a short, fairly level, but rocky trek through typical upper cumberland forest, we made a somewhat challenging descent to the cave entrance.  The cave entrance was refreshingly cool to sit by and have a snack and watch the water coming out of the cave. After a nice rest we ascended to the top of the trail again and took another spur trial to the Peter Cave entrance at the other end of the cave.  There were really two entrances/exits, and we could not decide which one was actually Peter Cave.  We did see a bat flying around one of the openings.  We did not enter the cave due to the ban on caving.  They are trying to prevent the spread of white nose syndrome that is affecting the survival of bats in TN.  We saw plenty of strange mushrooms and late summer wildflowers on the trail.  Then we hit one of the finer eating establishments in Sewanee for lunch.