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kvmapr
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Post subject: Highland County Cave Survey Report - 26-28 Nov. 2004
 Posted: Dec 01, 2004 - 03:59 AM
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Joined: Jun 16, 2004
Posts: 224
Status: Offline
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Highland County Cave Survey
Survey Report for
November 26, 27, and 28, 2004
We had a good survey this past weekend. As a matter of fact, this was the best weekend I have seen in a long time. On Friday Alex Dymersky, Barry Horner, and I headed to Bullpasture Mountainside Cave. We forded the Bullpasture River and water came in the up-stream door, going and coming. As we were going down the Hupman Valley Road we got a great view of a mature Golden Eagle that we could have run over with the truck. At the parking area Barry and I put our PVC suits on. Alex put on nylon. We teased, “Alex, what is wrong with this picture?” Alex set a pace that would have made Rick Royer proud. At their first stopping point I kept going, so did they. I thought, “Aren’t they ever going to stop and let me rest?” Our greatest fear was interfering with the deer hunters in the area. When we reached “The Ugly Tree” a hunter was dragging a deer he had just killed. He thanked us and explained there were too few hunters in the area and the deer were not moving. Our moving through the area to the cave drove the deer to him. Once at the cave we dropped our blaze orange and climbed down into the cave. Only a few people have accompanied Alex and Barry into the breakdown at the bottom of this cave. In the event they failed to return one night someone needed to know where these bad boys are playing. The entrance to the breakdown had a well-worn trail to it. At the first tight spot they told me not to touch the rock on the left. It was the Death Rock and has been waiting for someone to touch it all these months. Others had mentioned it before, now I knew what they were talking about. I didn’t touch it either! I remembered we had parked and approached the cave from a different direction than the note said on my kitchen counter. If something happened they would think we went to a different cave. Down we went through the breakdown. The thin, red, limestone layers, characteristic of the Keyser limestone, were everywhere. Once, we went up then down again. I marveled at how they had picked, and dug their way through the mess following the air. Down through the Concrete Chute. Then, down into a drain trap, into water and back up. I made a mental note that this cave is almost “rescue impossible”. This is not the place or day to take chances. Finally, we found a real wall, then real cave with two walls and a ceiling and floor. We had been following a stream down through the breakdown and the floor turned into a brown flowstone streambed. Next, we encountered a piece of webbing and Flowstone Falls. Down we went in the water to a junction where the last survey station was. Downstream was a canyon; to the left was a small lead. Alex chose to mop up the small lead before following the stream into the canyon. BIG MISTAKE! In two shots we were in a much bigger flowstone floored stream. Alex turned up-stream. In two or three shots we were at the bottom of a 30-foot high flowstone waterfall.
Rick Lambert rapping the 30' cascade of Flowstone Falls which is over 350' long and drops 150' so far! - photo by B. Horner
I tried to climb the waterfall and couldn’t do it. We were taking chances. I moved over to the right wall and slowly worked my way up to the top. It was low and wide with the water coming out of the left side of the passageway. I tried several rigging points and they failed. I finally found a horn in the ceiling that the webbing would grip and not slip off. As they climbed I held the webbing in the event the horn broke. It held, but again we were taking chances. We were now on our bellies in the water. Ahead a bat blocked my way. I blew on it repeatedly to get it to move. It wouldn’t! All three of us squeezed by it, bellies in the mud and water. I was lying in the water as I read my instruments. Alex was like a contortionist as he tried to read the instruments and stay out of the water. The stream-way went from a belly craw to hands-and-knees to walking into a high dome. Leads went in all directions. I went down into the stream again through formations into another dome with a side lead. Down into the stream again, through increasing formations. The cave was now prettier than Blue Grass Cave and even prettier than Sustained Orgasm Cave. It was a cavers delight! Then the formations started blocking the stream. With each obstruction the cave gave us a way past. Next we went up into a small dome around a flowstone choke back down into the stream. We were traveling slower, preserving the formations and completing the survey. Alex was wet, squeezing water out of his gloves. He said he was not cold. “He is tough”, I thought, “Another Ben Schwartz. I wonder how long we can hide him from Nevin?” I was wet under my PVC suit from sweat. Two to three second shivers every 10 to 15 minutes were warming me up. How can he not be cold. We are taking chances. I came prepared for a 24-hour trip. Barry’s step kids woke him up at O-dark-30. I could see on his face he was tired. Alex told his mom we would be back at 7PM. Eventually, the formations were going to shut us down. Barry guessed we were heading toward Chipmunk Hotel and the Hupman Valley sinkholes. We decided we should head out. We headed back to our starting point and ate lunch about four hours late. The trip out was slow. Up Flowstone Falls, down into the trap and back up. Up through the Concrete Chute, down once and back up again. Everything was a blur. Barry was fiddling with his light so I jumped ahead. Eventually the Death Rock came into view and finally the Big Room, then the cable ladder and a beautiful bright moon. The trip out was not as hard as I thought it would be. But that trip up the Bullpasture Mountain kicked my ass. We couldn’t find the normal trails we follow in the daylight but we came out on the road at the right spot. We undressed and dressed in the cold and headed home. Everyone should make this trip once. There is no one in this survey that can’t make this trip. It is a testimony of true determination and a great example of bigger caves through persistance. If there were medals for caving Barry and Alex would be candidates for the award. It took them many trips to get where they are now in the cave and I know without asking that it was worth the journey. “CAVES DON’T QUIT, CAVERS DO!”
On Saturday we had eight people show up. We divided into two groups. The dig group, consisting of Alex Dymersky, Dawn Farris, Rob Gucwa, Rick Royer, and Lisa Van Kylen, went to the Smith farm and continued to dig on Larry’s cave. They believe the cave is getting tighter as they go down. Even though a bar passes through the clay into space they don’t believe we are dealing with an hourglass opening. BUT, they didn’t call the cave dead.
The wet suit team, consisting of Brien Farris, Barry Horner, and I, headed to Dever Cave to do the water passage Rick Wagner waded into back in March of 2004. When we arrived there was still frost on the grass. Others come and do things they don’t want to do simply because they are committed to the project so we sucked up our guts and got naked and into our wet suits. (Barry is going to have a wet suit for sale real soon. He had to hold his together as I zipped it up.) Finally, suited up, we headed to the cave. At the entrance we moved the wire used to keep animals out and crawled into the cave. We encountered water almost immediately. Looking at the sketch we located the passageways in question and found that none of them went. Barry was hot! Apparently we had mis-communicated with the survey team. The only possible way on would require a sump diver. We touched up the sketch and headed out. After getting dressed we talked to the owner and told him the trip was unnecessary. He told us as kids he and his brother used to go in the cave and look down the hole the water comes out and wonder how far it went. I told him that type of exploration was beyond our capabilities this weekend but we would like to look at the Virginia Tech Hole. Back in the mid to late 1960’s some cavers from Virginia Tech came to his farm and asked if they could try to go into a hole on his property. He said yes and led them to a tight hole. They estimated the depth to be about 60 feet and one caver felt he could get in. As he tried to squeeze into the pit he set the grass and leaves around the entrance on fire with his carbide lamp. The owner said they had a hard time getting the fire out as the caver struggled in the hole. He never did get in. In the early 1990’s Ben Schwartz and I heard the story and did not look at the hole because we figured if they couldn’t get in then neither could we. But that was then and this is now. The owner led us to the hole and it was tight. It looked like it opened up after 6 feet. I briefed the owner on our digging techniques and he said, “Go ahead”. We dug all we could with conventional tools and eventually we had a cave. I told Barry and Brien to go ahead and drop the pit and tell me if it goes. I would pick up all my tools. Barry quickly informed me that since I was the smallest one in our group that I would be the first one down the hole. We picked up all the tools and suited up. I threaded my rack onto the rope and started sliding down the entrance. It was tight and I was having trouble pulling my pack after me. I finally worked my way down and my pack fell clear and I started speeding down a FAST ROPE! I quickly got another bar in use and stopped short of the floor. Barry followed with an “8”. When he hit the mound I commented, “Fast Rope.” He agreed. Brien started next but couldn’t get in. We watched in amazement as his two legs moved in all directions as he first tried to force his way in and then as he struggled to get back up. Barry and I discussed all the possible scenarios that could unfold if Brien couldn’t get out and if he (Barry) couldn’t get out. Brien did get out and started hammering at the ledges and Barry and I started the survey. We were in a fantastic looking canyon. The Ordovician limestone contained red layers, which is characteristic of the Moccasin limestone. The canyon looked a lot like Sustained Orgasm Cave, which is also in the Moccasin limestone, but in a different valley. There is something about this limestone and the passageway shapes that need further study. We surveyed about 250 feet of cave and left a lower, parallel canyon virgin due to a lack of a proper rigging point. Several smaller passageways were also left for Rick Royer. We surveyed up the drop and found the pit to be less than 40 feet deep. Both Barry and I exited with ease and “Virginia Tech Pit” was added to the database.
That night we celebrated my 50th birthday and 45th year of caving with cake and Crown. Since Carol wasn’t here nobody was drinking from the bottle and there was actually some Crown left over.
On Sunday Alex Dymersky, Barry Horner, Rick Royer and I headed to Sustained Orgasm Cave to re-rig the cave and continue the survey. I was to rig the cave as they surveyed behind me. Our intention was to leave the cave rigged until the survey is complete. Armed with two cable ladders and 11 25-foot pieces of webbing we started in. All the drops are between 10 and 30 feet deep. We quickly dropped in the entrance and down the two drops that lead to the Hall of Pits. We skirted over these pits to the top of Bad Omen Pit where they started the survey. I quickly rigged the drop into The Tomb and they followed. As they surveyed I quickly checked all leads and photographed all the skeletons. When I got to the passageway that drains The Tomb I slid down and popped into the bottom of Interruption Pit. I was now one level below my previous vantage point two months before, looking up at the highly decorated trunk passageway. The wall looked climbable and I relayed this back to the team. As I tried to climb the wall and go under an overhang a foothold broke off and I lost my nerve. Even with them spotting me and giving all the moral support they could I couldn’t climb the wall. I had lost all confidence in its ability to support me. I looked at the ledge I had been on during the previous trip and decided it would be safer. I got up there and was having second thoughts again. Alex came up and belayed me and right across I went. I tensioned a traverse line and backed it up and started down the highly decorated passageway looking for the next drop and found only wall. One turn, beyond what I could see on the last trip, the cave ended. A high, decorated lead was in the right wall, but thus far no passageways have been able to break free of the walls confining the cave. Our bet is this one will fail also. There was enough passageway and two leads left for another day of survey so we ended the survey and headed out. We left all drops rigged, except the entrance. Initially, I thought SOC was in the Moccasin limestone, but with the appearance of black chert in The Tomb I now believe we are much deeper in the column, probably in the Elway and Blackford of the Lurch limestone. A second observation is the cave from the Hall of Pits down is shattered. There are broken columns, 16-20” in diameter, on all levels. The flowstone is cracked and all drains are plugged with broken calcite. This is a beautiful cave in a state of collapse. There will be two more trips into this cave, a survey trip and a photo trip. The cave is sporting. Only the entrance is difficult (going out). If you want a good trip get on one of these teams.
The next survey weekend will actually be a weeklong event from December 25th to January 2nd. All of our children will be elsewhere, so if you need someplace to be on Christmas come on down and we will play underground. I am hoping for small teams each day of the week. Some of you have already sent the dates you can be available. Once I get more responses I’ll send out a tentative schedule of who will be here on what dates. I will then tailor the caves to the groups. The list includes, Conflict Cave, Singing Tree Cave, Bullpasture Mountainside Cave, Grants Tomb, April Showers Pit, Sustained Orgasm Cave, Virginia Tech Pit, and Eagle Cave among others. I hope to see all of you for a day or so.
Rick Lambert
NSS 12496 |
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posted by KVMAPR
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Post subject:
Posted: Dec 08, 2004 - 01:38 AM
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Dear Rick Lambert,
I am in China now and Rick Wagner was kind enough to send me your site. It is a wonderful Web Site. Very detailed and easy to load. We also have caves here in Northern China. I will send photos when I get the time. I am a volunteer here at a Non-Profit English School in Jiagedaqi [ Ja-ga-da-shi ]
Only 5 hours from Russia by Car. We teach Spoke English. Next summer I would like to invite some of your Cave members to visit here. Not only would they see Caves, but the Grate Wall and Forbidden City if the wish. Our Web Site is http://internationalesl.org/ our email is esl@whoever.com Best Wishes, Roy Lowe |
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