Exploring caves has never been high on my adventure-fantasy list, but when in Torotoro... do as Gonzalo Milan says.

Along with our monkeyboy guide William, we drove about 8 kilometers out of town to a random patch of hill, which served as the parking lot for Umajalanta cave. The remaining 1km walk seemed relatively harmless.

The altitude hit me fast—while at 2800 meters this was hardly the highest elevation I've experienced, we had only arrived in Bolivia 19 hours ago. I wheezed my way through the dry riverbeds, rolling green hills and dinosaur tracks littering the area. During pauses for breath I enjoyed the scenery...open fields that conjured up images of Africa, small canyons and grazing sheep. Hemmy skipped ahead, unaffected.

Miniature canyons along the route to Torotoro

William and Gonzalo distributed the super-sexy caving gear—hard hats with headlamps and stretchy kneepads. The initial descent was steep and slow-going—after all, there were no lighted pathways or tinkly ambient music. Baby William not only lugged around all the gear, occasionally taking our daypacks during tougher parts, but bounced around the cave in shower slippers.

Once inside, we found ourselves crawling on our knees through pools, sliding on our butts down dirt pathways, navigating the slanted cave floor in a manner reminiscent of the roller-rink game "crack the whip"—holding hands, lining up and going down sideways. We saw stalactites, all broken off at the points. Before the area became a national park, people took stalactites as souvenirs, doing irreparable damage. Surrounding us at various times were the cries of bats and the pings of underground water.

One of the most standout experiences for me was wriggling on my belly through extremely tight, sandy-bottomed tunnels, with no clue of their length, backpack and helmet scraping across the ceiling. Gonzalo demonstrated first; I'll never forget the image of his feet going limp periodically after telling us to suppress our fears to avoid suffocation.

The "tree", a fantastic stalactite formation

Another crazy moment was trying to rappel. The extreme dark and my extreme lack of grace was an awkward combination. In addition, we weren't actually secured to anything, we simply held the rope while jumping down the wall. After the first rappel, I decided to instead half-slide down the drops while Gonzalo caught me from underneath.

In a great chamber, we shut off our lamps, sat in a circle and held hands while Gonzalo thanked the gods for our safety. We finally reached a lake populated with tiny blind fish after a couple hours in the cave. Gonzalo told us that of Umajalanta's seven kilometers we had only explored one!

Going back was much more difficult than going in...I kept hoping a secret elevator was hidden behind a boulder somewhere. We took a different path on the way back to the mouth. The 1km walk back to the car was tough as well, as I was already exhausted from climbing back out.

According to Gonzalo, very few Torotoro guides take tourists caving. While I would never do it again, it was a fascinating experience.

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