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The Lift

These parts of the caves were filled with contraption, wood and ropes and water wheels, leavers to start things, stop things. Part of it was a crude conveyor on a track, that reached down into the darkness. “That,” she said, “is a blessing. It used to be murder to get the barrels back up to the surface.”

The whole thing was powered by a stream of water that fell out of a channel above, past the great wheel, and then down into a draining pool below. “We don’t know where it comes from, exactly,” she said, “and we don’t know where it goes. But it never stops. We are thankful for that.”