Philip Rykwalder, Heather Levy, John Swartz, Annie Blankenship, Ray Craig, Ryan Moran, Alan Cressler, Kristen Bobo, Brent Aulenbach
After crossing a moat in the dirt road seemingly constructed by a local, we begin our ascent. The road was pretty rough. We stopped to check out a burnt up 4-wheeler. Further up, we heard a loud spray of air while watching John’s truck violently thrash up and down. He’d blown a tire so we paused while he changed it. Finally, we ditched the two wheel drive vehicles, loaded our gear into the 4-wheel drive trucks, and started hiking. I spotted a snake on the sandy road that Alan identified as a hognose snake. Eventually, we left the 4 wheel drive trucks behind. We crested the ridge and climbed down the other side to the sink hole cave entrance.
Alan and I photoed Ryan posing within the entrance. He disappeared, and I soon followed. I squeezed down a narrow crack, traversed around the edge of a pit, and continued ahead eventually squeezing into a small waiting room next to the big pit. I took a bat and cave cricket close-up on my way there. Alan or Ryan dropped a rock down the pit and I heard a loud echoing boom. Nice! I waited as they rigged the pit and snapped a photo of Alan lowering the rope. Ryan disappeared down the hole. I took a couple pictures of Alan hanging 242 feet above the canyon floor and caught another picture of him descending into the darkness of Whopper Well.
It was soon my turn. I attached in and was soon descending down a large, deep canyon. A drapery paralleled the drop the entire way down. It was a very nice drop. When I reached the bottom I toured around and set up a picture looking back up the pit. I also photographed a large crayfish in a murky pool near where I’d got off rope. He was soon relocated by Kristine to a safer location. After touring around the large canyon, I eventually got bored and descended down another superb drop, Garden Handy Plunge, measuring 117 feet deep. At the bottom, I sat my slaved strobe in the middle of the pit bottom looking up and photographed Kristine who kindly rappelled slowly down. I took a couple more shots as Alan descended down. We ducked down a small hole and climbed up into a canyon passage which soon enlarged. Not far ahead, we reached the Ping Pong ball which was now free of the once encasing rock.
Brent wanted to check out a lead near the last pit but we were having trouble finding it. We squeezed through a tight slit in the flowstone wall into a continuation of the canyon and encountered a rather sketchy climb up a flowstone wall. Heather climbed up there and reported it didn’t go. She decided she wanted to do a pull down to get back down so I chucked a rope up to her. We went back into the main canyon and decided to do the last 67’ pit to bottom the cave.
We descended down a hole and a crevice, squeezed through a belly crawl, and canyoned ahead to the pit. Rappelling into the pit was somewhat awkward because we first had to climb and chimney down about 6 feet to a ledge to get on rope. When it was my turn, I clipped into the rope and begin to chimney down to the ledge. I got within a foot of the ledge but didn’t have anywhere else to place a limb to lower myself further. My back was uncomfortably scraping as I held myself between the two walls so I soon dropped the last foot onto the mud ledge, threaded my rack, and rappelled to the bottom of the pit passing a great deal of chert protruding from the walls. I met the others at the bottom and eventually traversed across the bottom of the pit to 6 – 10’ nuisance drop which led to the true bottom of the cave. I then waited as the others ascended up.
It seemed that the rope fed through my croll much worse than normal as I ascended the 67’ pit and also the 117’ pit. Maybe it was because the rope was so muddy. I had to grab the rope between my feet for about 40’ of the 117’ to get the rope to feed. Oh well. I tried to take a couple more pictures of Whopper Well while waiting on Heather to ascend the 117’ pit but had little luck because it was so foggy. My body was venting a great deal of heat. I gave up trying to take another picture and heard Heather nearing the top of the 117’ pit. Once she was up, I started to de-rig the pit which Phil soon took over so I could start my ascent out. He expected to have the rope de-rigged before I got very far up the rope so I could still carry it out but as soon as he got it de-rigged he heard Brent yell from below for the rope. Brent had gone to find his lead and was still at the bottom of the 117. We thought he'd already headed out. I ascended the 242’ pit and tried to take a couple pictures at the top but again had fog problems.
I waited above as Phil and Brent ascended. I took a couple pictures as Phil neared the top and later helped him de-rig the rope and headed back to the entrance. I passed my gear up to Alan and later pulled the ropes out that Phil handed up to me through the slit entrance. Alan and Annie headed off to a shelter cave while the rest of us routed back to our vehicles. We were glad to get off the mountain before dark. To Guess Cave
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Ryan rides some "reds" burnt up 4-wheeler.
Ryan rides some "reds" burnt up 4-wheeler.
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John fixes his flat tire midway up the mountain.
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Ryan poses within the entrance of Walking Fern Cave.
Ryan disappears into the cave.
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While waiting, I took a bat closeup.
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I also filled the screen with a cave cricket close-up.
Another cave cricket close-up.
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Alan feeds rope down the 242' pit.
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Alan begins his descent down Whopper Well.
Alan poses hanging 242' feet above the canyon floor.
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Alan disappears into the blackness.
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A large crayfish hiding in the murky water below Whopper Well.
Looking up from the huge canyon below Whopper Well.
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John poses next to a drapery.
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Kristen rappells descends Garden Handy Plunge.
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Kristen rappells descends Garden Handy Plunge.
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Kristen nears the bottom of the 117' pit.
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Alan pauses his descent to pose for a picture.
Philip nears the top of Whopper Well.
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