Caving "First Cave Sort Of"!

[Bo_Beck]

Pictures tell the story. I had an opportunity to go caving with "Cavers"
and what a trip it was!
GREAT group of folks and what a treat.
I'll tell some stories after I get some sleep :-)

[trackrunner]

nice TR

[forum8fox]

Good stuff right there!:2thumbs: I'm jealous for sure. I find that funny considering, recently I've been claiming I'm not going caving as much this year because I'm a climber and I missed out on alot of climbing last summer. Although if we have another rainy summer I might just have to give in...:mrgreen:
Some super nice photo's there, did you take all of them?

[Bo_Beck]

Good stuff right there!:2thumbs: I'm jealous for sure. I find that funny considering, recently I've been claiming I'm not going caving as much this year because I'm a climber and I missed out on alot of climbing last summer. Although if we have another rainy summer I might just have to give in...:mrgreen:
Some super nice photo's there, did you take all of them?

These are all photos that I took. I have many, many more. Dave that works at "The Rat" took a lot too and I'm anxious to see his, But, But, But I'm really looking forward to seeing the other Daves (He is the editor of NSS magazine) who was on the trip. We spent a full day in the cave assisting him take pictures. He had 5 or 6 flashes, and would place us strategically to take pictures within the cave. He had a small screen that we looked at his Compact Flash card with at camp last night. WoW were there some beauties that he took!

[accadacca]

Great photos. Looks awesome in there! :popcorn:

[oldno7]

WOW, Bo. Great shots and great adventure. Was any part of it a technical cave?

[Bo_Beck]

WOW, Bo. Great shots and great adventure. Was any part of it a technical cave?

Well?! Funny you should ask. Originally discovered it was non-technical, and it remains that way except for one slight deviation. We had finished caving for the day. Kyle and Pat had opted to remain in the cave to sleep, and the rest of us chose to make the 20 min. descent back to basecamp. As we were cooking up dinner, sipping some grog and viewing Daves photos on his small monitor, we kept hearing yelling. Couldn't make it out, but it continued about every minute. After about 10 minutes I couldn't take it anymore. I could only imagine that one of them had failed on the 8' drop out of the hole in the wall and missed the ledge and continued down another 30' to the rocks below. I grabbed a headlamp and scrambled the 500' up to the base of the redwall and then traversed 1/4 mile to the cave entrance. I'll be damned if Pat hadn't come out of the hole and traversed to the right 30' and up 10' to another cave. He had a big s**t eatin grin on his face and said "I'm stuck"! He had been yelling for over a half hour as darkness set in and the temps dropped. He hoped that he could get Kyles attention deep inside the other cave gettin some shut eye. I couldn't help but laugh, and then got out the radio and called back down to basecamp to bring up a rope. Well when Ty got there with the rope, he just looked up to his friend and said "You dumba$$ (dumb-@$$), you are not my friend anymore". He dropped the coiled up rope and said, "I want you to look at this rope all night and and wish you had it up there!" He then picked up his pack and headed back down and reminded me that I shouldn't give in and give him the rope. Well.....I just couldn't handle that big grin looking down at me, so I first yelled into the cave and woke Kyle and had him crawl out to see what was up. He almost fell out of the entrance laughing his a$$ off, and then I threw the rope up to Pat. He found a good natural thread and rapped back to the ground below. I went back to basecamp and was pissed off that I hadn't brought a camera! We all sat around and had a great laugh, viewed Daves photos, ate some grub, drank some grog, and went to bed.

[jumar]

Awesome!!

[oldno7]

Great Story............

How deep is this cave? Did you guys see all of it?

[DiscGo]

Great post!

[Bo_Beck]

Great Story............

How deep is this cave? Did you guys see all of it?

I believe that Kyle said that he's mapped 4000' feet so far? He stayed there after Dave and I left to finish mapping it. I do know that they found another lead, and that Pat is a damn good "pusher"? Dave (works with me at The Desert Rat) and I drove down on tuesday morning with the others, but we had to return thursday to work on friday. The other four "cavers" remained to finish their work in the cave. I think they will be coming out today? We as a group saw most of the mapped 4000' on tuesday, but there were some areas that we didn't visit. I'm quite certain that Kyle didn't want us to visit some areas that were just too fragile? My understanding is that there have been only a dozen people that have had the opportunity to enter this cave. After talking with Dave (editor of NSS Newsletter), I realized the magnitude of this discovery? He had been invited to photograph the cave, and after entering the cave with him, he seemed very impressed with what was there. Ty is writing an article for the next NSS newsletter/magazine, and Dave's photographs will adorn the article as well as a cover photo I think? I was able to see Daves (the Dave that I work with) photos and videos yesterday, and he got some really nice documentation, but I'm really looking forward to seeing the "proffessional' shots that the "other" Dave took!

[forum8fox]

What a trip for your first outing, that seems to be a very pretty cave. So is it gated or can anyone go see it?

Also, did you catch the bug? Are you dyeing to get out to more caves?

[Bo_Beck]

What a trip for your first outing, that seems to be a very pretty cave. So is it gated or can anyone go see it?

Also, did you catch the bug? Are you dyeing to get out to more caves?

It was a really spectacular cave! I remember when I was a wee-one back in the 60's, I toured Carlsbad Cavern with my family. From what I remember, this cave was even more spectacular! It was gated just after it's discovery in the summer of 2008. I guess it's a shame, but on the other hand it might be a good thing? I almost (not really though) didn't enjoy this "caving stuff" because I was very tense and nervous about breaking even the tiniest crystal! I have to admit I did break one short soda straw off the nine hours I spent in there. I feel very guilty about this. I could only imagine what might happen if the cave were open to the general public? It's such an extremely FRAGILE environment!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I still am a very claustrophobic person, and the 50' belly crawl made me a bit nervous, but I'd do this again. I'm not sure I'd want to do much squeezing though? If I can stand up or crab crawl I'm ok with caving, but a bunch of super tight spaces would probably change my mind and desire?

[accadacca]

I still am a very claustrophobic person, and the 50' belly crawl made me a bit nervous, but I'd do this again. I'm not sure I'd want to do much squeezing though? If I can stand up or crab crawl I'm ok with caving, but a bunch of super tight spaces would probably change my mind and desire?
Ditto. :eek2:

[Sombeech]

Awesome :eek2:

[forum8fox]

I'm not suprised it's gated, it looks REALLY pretty, and alot of the features look pretty voulnerable. Still though, how likely is it that someone from the general public would stumble on to the cave? I have been into some caves that I feel are closely comperable, and none of them were gated. However getting to the goods isn't exactly super easy, some of them take vertical work, others require some tight squeezing. One in particular requires a 3+ mile hike with lots of vert, you get there and rap over 100' to get in. Once inside this cave it's like a narrow slot canyon, eventually you have to do a 60' free hangingn rap next to a water fall, then crawl over 200' in a very cold stream (army crawling).

As far as the claustraphobia goes, I think over time depending on how bad you have it you might be able to work past it in most places. It's interesting because I never really thought I was claustraphobic but I've had a couple times where I got a little nervous and anxious to get out. I find that the more I go caving and the more I demand of myself the more I get comfortable with my surroundings. An exception though would be this cave called premonition, its way back on rough dirt roads and the cave has 1.9 miles of passage. A friend and I got way back in there and were both pushing seperate very narrow worm hole tube type things, we both got nervous before getting too far apart and backed out. The lead I worked was very narrow and conveluted, it was twisty and starting to go down and remain tight so I was like no thanks, especially with just the 2 of us if I couldn't back out on my own or find a spot to turn around I would have been marooned.

I was pushing a different lead also far back in the same cave, it was like a pit that I could slide down into then it started to go horizontal right as it started to get really tight, I wouldn't dare to go in there head first, so I slid in feet first untill I got to a point that I didn't know if I'd be able to slither back up and decided screw this again, becasue my partner was seperated by a decent distance from me this time not to mention some climbing that was involved to get to where I was.

I think it's just about pushing your comfort level while making educated decisions on where to push it and where to turn back.

Here's a couple tight squeezes in our alpine colorado caves
33410.33409.33408.33407

You should check out the TR's I've posted up and let me know what you think. Also if you ever feel like coming out and doing any of these caves let me know.

[Bo_Beck]

KypetCave