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MET Grotto, the caving club to which I belong, is one of over 200 NSS chartered caving clubs, and was created in 1949, making it one of the oldest in the country. MET has an average membership of about 150, and offers caving trips of all types. Locally, we spend much of our time, on an almost weekly basis in the summer months, caving in the Albany and Schoharie county areas of New York. We even have the benefit of the use of a cabin and campground, equipped with an outhouse, situated less than 300 feet from 3000 foot long Schoharie Cave. Other trips run by MET on a regular basis includes: bi-monthly trips to Central Pennsylvania, tri-monthly trips to West Virginia, semi-annual trips to TAG Country (that area where the states of Tennessee, Alabama and Georgia come together) and Puerto Rico, and annual trips to Russia and Ukraine. In addition, our members also occasionally visit caves in England, Spain, Mexico and Australia.
As for the cost of MET Grotto trips, they range from as little as just sharing gas and toll money when car pooling upstate, to $280 for our recent 10 day PR trip, which included round-trip airfare, lodging, van rental, and gas/tolls. My most recent 3 week trip to Ukraine cost each individual $1180 total; including all gas, food,lodging, and airfare all included. We depend much on the kindness and goodwill of fellow cavers throughout the world, who don't think twice about offering us lodging in their homes. Thus, the relatively low costs for our trips.
While most caves in the Northeast tend to be cold, wet and only several miles in length, with New York McFails being one of the largest at 7.5 miles, the caves of West Virginia tend to be much larger, warmer and deeper, with lengths typically in the range of anywhere from 5 to 12 miles. Then, there are the TAG caves which are unique because of the nature of many of their entranceways: deep pits of several hundred feet in length, with my favorite being Fantastic Pit (586 ft.) at the top of the list.
Well, as you probably guessed by now, there is a wide variety of caving out there, with New York offering a little for everyone: there are vertical, horizontal only, wet low water crawls, huge entrance pits, and just down right friendly caves like Wards-Gregory in Clarksville, NY.
In addition to offering caving trips, our grotto also offers vertical training, indoors in NYC in the winter, and outdoors up at Schoharie and/or Kingston, NY in the summer.
If you would like to become a member of the MET Grotto, check out info about joining here
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