Caves and caving Ara climbing Cavers in caves: People who love going into tight, dark, muddy places. Joke VanSweevelt coming around a corner Cave rooms and passages: Beautiful places under the earth’s surface. Weakly-crystalline chrysachola stalactite Cave formations: fragile beauty Snottites Snottites: microbe-created mucous-y pendant formations that often drip sulfuric acid. Yellow and white microbial colonies floating on a small pool Cave Life: microbes and invertebrates.