January caving in Marion

A survey trip was initiated for January 25 and 26. While the destination initially not set mostly due to weather conditions. The intent was to try to get the newly named Snow Cone cave on Saturday and Horseshoe on Sunday; both are ongoing TriTrog projects. The initial interest in the trip was high, upward to 12 people. However due to various circumstance, the available cavers fell to five. Five soles ready to face what Mother Nature was going to dish on us.


Waking up to single digits it was clear the ground to the cave would be frozen solid; the ground conditions put the landowner at ease. As we headed over Walker Mountain the snow started; it was immediately clear any additional snow would result in the return trip would be through the mountain gap in Chilhowie.


Having been suited up, we hurried into the cave and immediately felt the temperature relief. A quick show and tell of the “snow cone” put us at our first lead. To get warmed up I thought walking passage would be a good place to start, and it was the biggest hole in the current sketch. Five shots later we were 230ft into new passage headed back toward the hillside we entered yet another vast room; the third large room. After surveying the room we hammed it up for a couple of photographs and retreated back to the hole in the floor we left.


The passage was the smallest passage of the day though it opens up after a few small sections. Once through the small stuff we called the survey. We left walking passage yet to survey! It already has me wanted to get back to continue.


Returning to the surface yielded a couple more inches of snow and bitter cold. Fortunately Howard brought along a propane heater! It is amazing how fast you can get into street clothes when motivated. Soon we were driving out of the property and onto the snow covered roads.


The Italian restaurant was already closed by 7:30; we opted to McAdoo’s instead. From inside we watched it continue to snow heavily. I mention that because we getting back to my truck, the driver window was “missing” and snow inside. Initially thinking the glass shattered, the window ended up down in the door. However the window would not go up, nor could we reach it to pull it up. What a cold ride back to Tanya’s. At Tanya’s we pulled the panel off and was able to get the window closed. It was so cold Duck tape frozen before it would adhere to the cold window.


Sunday morning brought a balmy 30 degrees and getting the window fixed enough to get back to Raleigh was not such a miserable experience. Fortunately, once on route 81, the roads were dry and driving uneventful.


The single lead resulted in 485ft of survey and four additional leads. The sketch looks more complete with the work done, but the cave has already left us wanting to return to continue. The cave has far exceeded by expectations; in size and in beauty. The current surveyed distance is approximately 2000ft.

Doc the Halls

Even with Pete’s sleeping bag, I was somehow able to see out the rearview window of my vehicle as Rob Harris, Sarah Dotson, Pete Hertl, and I traveled together to Marion. The traffic was backed up in Greensboro. We spent the night at Tanya McLaughlin’s home with the intent to go caving on Saturday.

After a leisurely breakfast we started out for Saltville Quarry Cave, but I encouraged Tanya to try to reach another landowner first. That resulted in a quick directional change just a hundred yards from Tanya’s house. Then we discovered the likely carsick victim and moved the person to the front seat…and we were finally off to Linda’s Lair.  Within sight of a house built circa 1830, the cave entrance had been covered in brambles but was definitely human-sized. I stood in the rain pulling brambles up from the slide-in entrance while the other four went inside. It led into a room at the base where everyone could stand, but the dirt fill suggested we weren’t going any deeper.

Garbage bags covered the seats in my vehicle, and we headed for Saltville Quarry Cave. Tanya charmed the landowner’s son into giving us permission to map the cave, and we set off through a pouring storm in 36-degree weather. The cave entrance was so much warmer.  Of course they sent me scouting down the wet passage because I wore wellies that day; high boots didn’t help much when the water depth reached my knees.

Fortunately the lead on the left took us to a drier, higher passage. I set survey stations and worked with Rob at mapping the entrance room while the others goofed around in the warmer passage. A tight crawlway led us up into a well-decorated hallway, and our whole group surveyed all the way to the end…well, to the spot where it got too tight for me. Pete and Sarah learned surveying fast. Rob managed to squeeze under a ledge to some “going” passage.

We surveyed about 435 feet in Saltville Quarry Cave that day and still have the wet hallway to explore.  It was a cave worth seeing, but my coveralls smelled pretty bad after the trip. I wish that I had an outdoor place to clean them in December.

Hancock Cave Bat Count

This year’s bat count at Hancock Cave started a bit shaky. I wasn’t sure who was coming and going as the week progressed, but Mike Broome and Lisa Lorenzin stepped forward at the last minute to help. Jenny Hundertmark, Mike, Lisa, and I stayed at Tanya McLaughlin’s house Friday night. On Saturday morning we met the campers: Matt Lubin, Matt Weiss, Matt Nelson, Steve Molnar, Ashland Nelson, and about six scouts. Having Matt Jenkins along just would’ve confused us more.

After the entrance climbs, we split into two groups in search of bats in the same rooms we’ve checked in past Novembers’ counts (since WNS was discovered there in 2009). My group seemed to enjoy clambering around while looking up at the ceiling. Matt N. dove into every hole I’d point out, and Matt L., Jenny, and the scouts followed him willingly into most of them. The squeeze out to Hickory Dickory Pit was one the adults enjoyed while the scouts stayed with me in the Echo Chamber.

We found three different bat species, and the other team also located a few bats that we didn’t see.  Both groups had to negotiate past the one at the base of the Corn Cob Crawl. The count was roughly the same as last year.

My team was lucky enough to come out to the cool temperatures first, so we donned our orange vests and hiked over to Little Hancock Cave (no bats there). The walls were alive with harvestmen so thick that the walls seemed to be moving. After a short search, they were able to find the Peacock Entrance to Hancock Cave (no bats there). We went back to the cars, changed clothes, examined the map, called into the cave for the other team, and eventually helped them exit. Next time we should remember to coordinate exit times.

New River Cave Clean-up Trip

With landowner permission, the annual grotto clean-up this year was held at New River Cave. Usually we aim for something in Smyth county, but we had a hard time coming up with a good candidate over there this year, which is a good thing, so we instead headed off to New River Cave on a tip from Ken Walsh. We all drove up to the nearby Bat Ranch on Friday night and had a rather quiet night camping under the clouds and stars. Mike was asleep when many of us arrived and Ava, who was very helpful in making sure we were taken care of, was out of town.

The trip was pretty straight forward. Hike up steep hill, clean graffiti, pick up trash, have fun, get tired, turn around, exit cave, hike down steep hill. Am I forgetting anything? We had a nice turn out with 11 cavers coming, many of whom it was only their first or second time underground. Hopefully some of them will be back for more because caving is awesome. (Cave survey is especially cool ;p)

Ken explaining a bit about how fun caving is and how to make sure it doesn't become no fun.

Ugliness on walls being removed by smiling faces.

The roof graffiti was a pain here, but the Price's did a good job clearing it off.

Insert pun here

Lunch

Pretties -- with Mark for scale

Awkward family photos.

 

 

Typical Easy VAR Caving

Saturday morning Diana Gietl and I scoped out Culverson Creek Cave (Wildcat Entrance) for a future photography trip. We were joined by Karen Willmes and Dave West, two of my best friends who happened to arrive at VAR/YTR the night before just minutes behind us.

Diana saw many potential places to shoot photos on a future day. We slipped down the entrance climb into a stoopway that soon became walking height, and then we had high ceilings for the rest of the trip (not counting Dave’s side leads).  The entrance passage eventually dumped us into the main stream, and we headed upstream first to wide passages (and eventually a sump). Be warned that a misstep in this area could leave you in mud up to your knee.

Downstream travel was less muddy but more wet.  I felt foolish taking some extra time skirting one pool, but I remembered it as a necessary maneuver in order to stay dry.  Diana found it trickier on the way out and found herself sliding into the creek up to waist deep.  The best treat was a number of Northern Spring Salamanders, in addition to the white crayfish.

While Diana napped after the short cave trip, Karen, Dave, and I wandered down to the entrance to Poor Farm Cave at the far end of the property. Karen and I joined George Dasher from there to walk off in search of the lost entrance for Rimstone Falls Cave. Unfortunately we stopped at the electric fence so missed out on the cave.

We had a great catered dinner. Diana liked it so much that she retrieved her flipped plate from the patio deck and scooped up the whole meal.  The evening continued with the funk music of Septatpus, including a song dedicated to Rob Harris.

On Sunday I sat through the VAR meeting and then went back to camp to find that the sun’s heat had driven Rob Harris and Diana from their tents. I put on fresh caving clothes, and we set off for Poor Farm Cave for a one-hour trip. The coolest thing in Poor Farm Cave was a hidden whistling passage.

SPRING VAR 2012 REPORT

by Peter T. Hertl

The 2012 Spring VAR (NSS Virginia Area Regional Caving Event) was held in a farm pasture North of Lewisburg, WV.  The weather during the night was still a bit nippy, but daytime temps were enjoyable.  Of course, you only had to worry about that if you were on the surface!

There were about a dozen signup sheets for trips ranging from 2 hr children’s trips to some fairly rigorous vertical trips.  Each signup sheet had a brief description of the trip and a stated limit on the number of participants so the group size was appropriate to the size and difficulty of the cave.  Additionally, there was a Vertical Training Clinic offered and the “Grapevine” entrance to the nearby commercial cave LOST WORLD CAVERNS was also rigged for descents and climbs all day.

I chose to go on a 10 person trip to Norman Cave, a part of the 20 mile Bone-Norman Cave complex.  Bone is VERY dry, and connects to Norman by a narrow passage called “The Pinch”.  We did not do a through trip on this occasion, and our trip was limited to the Norman Cave side, which is primarily an active stream passage.

The group met at 9 am and made the approx 20 mile drive to the cave.  Parking was not a problem, and the trail to the cave is short.  We were underground before 10 am, and after a short orientation by Jeff, the trip leader, we proceeded deeper into the cavern.  The climb-down into the stream passage was not too bad, and the waterfall that starts the stream passage had a strong flow and was very loud.  After enjoying the falls, we proceeded down stream.

As stated on the sign up sheet, we did get wet.  Most of the trip was spent walking in the rapidly flowing water which ranged from ankle deep to waist deep.  Fortunately, the waist deep part was only in two short sections, and did not prove to be much of a problem for anyone on the trip.  There were a couple of other areas called falls that were a little loud, but qualified more as rapids than actual waterfalls.

On the way in we made one side trip off the stream passage to visit the Carmel Room.  I’m not sure why it is named that, but perhaps it was the color of the large flowstone and curtains that were the main decorations observed. The room was a popular stop and we took a lot of photos of the main formation and its’ reflection in the pool of water at its base.

Toward the end of the trip, slower members of the party took their time returning upstream toward the entrance, and some of the group started to get a little cold from the water, and sought refuge outside the entrance.  This gave Todd and I a chance to spend a good bit of time in the West Virginia Room located near the first waterfall.

The room is fairly heavily decorated compared to the other parts of the cave we had seen, and we spent most of the time taking photos.  We also carefully examined what had been billed as broken formations.  They were indeed broken, but it looked as though the damage had been caused by breakdown falling from the ceiling rather than vandalism.  Perhaps this had happened during the recent earthquakes that occurred in the Virginias, and if so, was the second such damage within caves I have seen this year.

If you did not make it to Spring VAR… too bad… you missed it.  However, the next such regional cave event is Fall VAR.  The time and place are being planned now, so watch for the announcement in the near future.

Last run on the Sink...Mudding in Hell

Date: 14 Jun 2013-16 Jun 2013

I arrived after some prep time at Carlin's place in Durham, with a much distressed soon to die water pump in the car. After the gear move to his car, we were off. The drive up pretty uneventful, smooth sailing and a good time to eat a sandwich. Next day, we got to the cave around 930-1000. The trip in was tight and muddier than I remembered. The path seemed longer, for some reason. We got in and Carlin lead off to get some sketches while I caught up. This trip was a lot harder than I wanted it to be. Once at recovery junction, we made some plans to traverse a few points on the left, getting cross section sketches along the way. The sketching did not take long, just about 10-15 min, I assume. When done, it was back to recovery junction and off to the pit traverse. Across that, and a few squeezes later, we ran headlong into more mud. It made the slopes in there a whole lot tougher to climb. At one point, I found it easier to rely on my mechanics skills to scoot myself up the slope by hanging on the ceiling. My choice in packs for my gear at this point was becoming a pain in the... At any rate, it was the death of that one on the way out. The path onward was one full of surprises. I had some trouble due in large part to no traction from my boots. But hey that happens. The points that were needed for surveying will still have to wait until someone else does them. When there at the critical junctions, there was a lot more mud and it was tight, Carlin opted not to press on, I volunteered being there and all. But we passed on them due to the conditions of the cave. I think that was the wiser choice. We did have some fun on the way out at the section now dubiously titled Muddy Flags, all puns intended. The giant slide was the best, and the quickest way down. It got a little scary, truth be told.The next week, my ribs quit hurting about Wednesday. In closing all in all a good trip, scary at times. I'll be ready for the next non-Cold Sink trip just as soon as I get new boots and a good gear pack, because confidentially this one was ridiculous. Sunday---That for me was Water pump Showdown. Nothing a mechanically inclined tech can't handle. Job started about at 1500 completed 1820..No worries, just sweat and pain on sore ribs. A few cuts and a sunburn or two, nothing major, really. Just a well placed oh S*** in traffic when the pump died from being jammed. So far, no leaks.

-Martin G.