Joined: Jul 13, 2004
Posts: 4
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December 2004 MDC Trip Report.
On Sunday, December 5th, I arrived in Germany Valley and met up with Yvonne Droms at the 4U Restruant. I arrived there 5 minutes after her and to our surprise, Bill Stone, Andi Hunter and Pawel Skoworodko arrive 5 minutes after me. Breakfast was full of food and conversation. We started making plans and one of them was for Yvonne and I to enter the cave to open up the Puppet Buster in a couple of places so that the large packs we would be bringing in would be easier to pass.
After breakfast, we all drove to Devin Kouts property and did a little organizing of community gear, Yvonne and I entered the cave. This was Yvonne’s first time in the cave. We had three packs between us. On of community gear, Yvonne’s camp pack and my pack with drilling gear. Progress into the cave was quick and we made the bottom of the 50’ drop in 1.5 hours.
My first mission was to establish a gear hang/line at the end of the Puppet Buster so that we could hang gear free from people, ledge and ultimately assist getting on and off rope at the 125’ drop. I then attempted to open up the little channel on the floor just before the rope. No success. After I ran out of batter power, we headed out. It was an 8 hour trip.
Yvonne and I joined Bill, Andi and Pawel at the lower house at McCracken’s. Pawel was up and waiting for us. Bill and Andi were asleep in their tent. Yvonne took it upon herself to wake the two up and get the party going. Bill started playing his guitar and we all sang; Andi made up new and more appropriate verses to existing songs. The party ended in the early hours of the morning.
Pawel Skoworodko and Lewis Carroll leave Camp for the surface after 6 days underground in Memorial Day cave- photo by Yvonne Droms
In the morning, we slept in due to the late evening and Andi’s long trip from Alaska and started getting organized at an appropriate hour (after 1 pm). Upon packing up, Bill made the back of his truck look like a modular container ship. Boxes here, boxes there, boxes on top of boxes and then, when all was said and one, the one last box to go in was discovered! Reorganized and do it all over again.
We entered the cave late Monday afternoon. We had 4 big bags and one small bag (my personal pack). Of course Yvonne and I had dumped one bag in the cave the day before at the bottom of the 50’. One more bag to push, pull and move! At the bottom of the drop we repacked gear out of the “5th” pack and proceed to camp. The trip took us about 6 hours. Not bad for the load we were carrying.
Tuesday morning, we headed to the Hunter traverse to climb the dome. Pawel took the lead and went across and then up. He found a tall, narrow canyon which is a massive pain for use bigger tall folks. At the end was a 15’ drop. No rope. Andy and Bill went up to look at the passage while Pawel and I derigged the belay station and brought all the gear down to the Gypsum Borehole. There is voice communications between the upper passage and Lewis Traverse and a small in-feeder just before CMG pit.
Wednesday started off with Pawel and I going up to the 15' pit, rigging it and then dropping into the larger canyon section. Very pretty. I will have to return to survey this in February when I can get back to camp.
We then proceeded to the waterfall at CMG pit. Bill lead out and Pawel finished the traverse climb. At one point, Pawel informed us that the waterfall was coming out of a small 2’*2’ passage which just kept getting smaller. Bummer!
But Pawel kept drilling. We informed him that he should save the battery power instead of trying to open up the passage. As we later found out, he had crammed himself into the 2*2 and was trying to get out. He was ultimately successful.
To assist all this climbing and belaying, I sacrificed all my carabineers to the belay ledge. So I started to did open the crawlway we used to get to the backside of the CMG pit. It follows all the mandates of a QD. I was not successful in getting two big rocks outs. So, it is hands and knees except for the last 1 foot where it goes to elbows and knees. Sorry.
Back to camp we go. Thursday, … ? We lost Thursday somewhere in the space time continuum. Something about long days and long nights.
On Friday morning, we headed back towards the entrance with all the climbing gear. We were going to climb the “Gillis Lead”. We Pawel started up. Several hours later, Mark Stover, Robert Monczka and Yvonne Droms came strolling by us. They were on their way into camp.
The climb at the Gillis lead started off fast and furious. Then Pawel hit bad rock. He spent several hours getting around the bad rock and ultimately came up 2 or 3 bolts short of getting into the window. Next month Mark and I will finish the climb and see what is in the big window.
All climbing gear was left at the base of the Gillis lead. Why bring it back to camp. We were ½ way to the entrance and had no more bolts.
The party started with dinner and continued into the night, … or morning…. Time was irrelevant. We had already lost a day somewhere, sometime this week.
Mark, Robert, Yvonne, Bill and Andi went to dig on a passage off of the Gypsum Borehole. Mark and I had surveyed it several months before and had begun to dig on it in November. It is a good going lead and will hopefully open up into something good. It is going north and has air moving through it. They evidently made good progress and the next time we are there, it will open up! Guaranteed!
Saturday morning, Pawel wanted out. I was not at all opposed to the idea. So I packed up my stuff, and Pawel got ready to leave. His bag and most of his stuff was at the Gillis lead. So he traveled light for the first hour.
When I caught up to Pawel at the gear depot, he had packed all the vertical gear (drill, 2 batteries, climbing rack, etc) into his pack. He lacked space for the hammer. I said I could take that. His pack weighed 50+ pounds! I talked him into leaving one battery at the bottom of the 125’. I was tired of watching him run through the cave with a pack I could hardly lift.
We reached the surface and the sun was not there to greet us. It was overcast and a drizzly snow helped push us to the trucks. Dry, warm, unstinky clothes for the first time in 6 days! Heaven on earth is a pair of dry underwear and socks. Ohhhhhhhh! The next best thing was being able to chew food. Freeze dried and noodles lack the resistance needed to bit into your food and grind it down with your molars. I wanted MEAT for dinner. Dinner was at the restraunt at the Caverns. NO steak! I settled for pork chops.
That night, we spent at the lower house at McCracken’s with G. Brace.
Sunday morning was spent driving around around and ultimately ending up at Devin’s property. I departed the scene around 1 pm leaving Pawel with Devin, Tom and Rick O. |
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