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Jimron Well & More
Jeff Moore, Alan Cressler
The drive down south was pretty good. About 2 hours into the drive I was back up to a 64 mph average which is pretty good considering it took me an hour and 15 minutes to get around Indy and onto 65 South. I got stuck in traffic in Nashville because they had the interstate down to 1 lane. I made one stop in Elizabeth town for gas. I had a few tired mishaps on the way down that delayed me another 45 minutes. Finally I made my way up the cabin steps and entered Marion’s house where Jeff and Alan were waiting for me. Total drive time was about 7.5 hrs. I was certainly tired at this point in time. We talked for awhile and then went to bed. I crashed on Marion’s couch.
Alan woke me up around 8:35 AM Saturday morning. I’d got to sleep in so late because we were expecting Nate to show up. I soon had my stuff packed in his truck and we headed off to Fall Creek Falls State Park. Jeff was pleased to hear that we’d be descending over 300 feet to the valley floor and hiking up the other side of the valley to reach Jimron Well. But before that we had a few small Hartzell caves to visit.
The first cave was called Quicklink Cave. It was neatest of the 3 Hartzel caves. It basically consisted of a 25 feet of passage to a 90 degree joint to the left which continued as 25 more feet of passage to E2. Just above the joint there was a small hole that led to an upper passage which led to E3 and E4 which were directly above E1 and E2. There was another passage that took off diagonally which led to E5. Alan took some pictures while Jeff napped and I headed off in search of the next cave.
I followed the Hartzell bluff until I found Trap Cave. I entered a small slot in the rock wall and crawled into a crawling room and continued my crawling descend to the end of the cave probably 75 feet from the entrance. Unlike Quicklink Cave, this cave was quite cool which felt good because it was very hot outside. I hiked back to Quicklink and told Alan about the other cave. Eventually, Jeff stopped napping and showed interest in the cave. Even though I’d walked right to Trap Cave the first time for some reason it was now evading. I don’t suppose I’d really paid that much attention to where it was because I’d already visited it and had no intention of going back. Oh well, I determined that it must only be possible to find the cave once and later told Alan he wasn’t allowed to go back and prove me wrong J
While Jeff and I were looking for Trap Cave Alan had found the 3rd cave, Angle Cave. Angle Cave wasn’t very nice. The entire 50 feet consisted of somewhat awkward passage. At least it was a through trip. I squeezed out of the exit and Jeff flopped out and laid there for a minute claiming to be stuck. Soon Jeff plopped out and we crossed the valley and began up the other side. The hike up to Jimron Well winded me a bit which was probably a combination of the heat and my carrying more weight than everyone else. Anyway, the entrance to Jimron Well was impressive. It was about 75’ long and probably 30’ across. I rigged the rope into a tree up the sink hole slope and Alan started down. He was soon complaining that the rope was rigged directly in a waterfall so he re-belayed on a small tree rooted in shale next to the pit lip. He went down and I soon followed. The drop was somewhere around 60 feet. I landed crossed over a breakdown pile and descended down the other side where I photographed Jeff’s decent. It was very pretty looking up. The dark ceiling had a neat profile and rays of light shone into the pit. The picture quality was acceptable but I wish I’d had a better camera. A digital SLR would have been great.
Once everyone was down we searched around for the continuation. Marion had apparently turned around at what he’d called a second pit so we brought another rope with us. There was no second pit. Just a climb down into a nice sized breakdown room whose slope intercepted a walking passage. We first went many hundred feet upstream. It was evident that the passage completely floods. Jeff and I were fortunate enough to get our backs slimed by accidentally touching the ceiling while stoop walking. The passage ended in fill. We routed back to the breakdown room and followed the passage the other way. It soon ended as well so we reattached our V-gear, climbed back up through breakdown, did a short squeeze, and pulled ourselves back into the main pit. Alan ascended first. Of course as soon as he was 40 feet up I spotted a garden snake. There were actually many garden snakes. Once announced to Alan he soon spotted a copperhead perched near where Jeff was sitting. He ascended the rest of the way up and I followed. While we were waiting on Jeff to get up we heard the tree creak loudly. Jeff was apparently far enough down that he didn’t notice. He wasn’t real happy to hear about it when he reached the top.
We de-rigged and descended back down the hill. I’d determined that I was going to trash my boot as soon as possible because the sides had slit and it felt like I was wearing a slipper. My right foot was swimming all around inside the boot. Eventually, we started up the other side of the valley. The climb up was very hot. It seems like the last few weekends have been hotter than I would have preferred. Oh well, I’d still take summer over winter any day. I hope it stays nice through December like it did last year.
Alan must have realized that Jeff and I weren’t enjoying the climb. He actually stopped and we breaked there for about 5 minutes. I had cooled off and felt much better during the rest of the climb. We weren’t really that far from the top when we stopped for a break. We ascended the rest of the way back to the car and then drove to our next cave which was road side. I followed Alan into the narrow entrance to Pyramid Block cave. We followed some walking passage down and then climbed back up to the rig point where Alan rigged in and I slid clutching the rope to my side through a slimy crawlway which lowered to almost a belly crawl. There was nowhere to step except into the slop-mud on the other side. I lowered the rope over the metal bar and down the pit. I descended down. The pit really wasn’t anything special. It was very slimy. Over halfway down I reached a small hole. Rather than go through the hole, I detoured to the side down an adjacent shaft. The rope didn’t quite reach the bottom but came with 15 feet or so. I swung onto a ledge and changed over to climb back out.
My croll wasn’t feeding correctly again on the way out. I don’t think I’d yet had problems with this croll. I would attribute it to the muddy rope except it did it again the next day. I need to trash both my crolls and buy new ones. It really sucks climbing but having to hesitate because your croll doesn’t catch. Anyway, I reached the top and did my best to extract myself through the slimy mess without getting too messy. Alan said I looked much better than other people he’d seen who did the pit. Now it was Jeff’s turn. Alan and I laid next to the rig while Jeff enjoyed the pit.
We then de-rigged and left the cave. My vertical gear was now slimed. We still had a couple more caves to do that day. We passed Rumbling Falls and parked down the road from the Camp’s Gulf parking area. We then hiked down to the creek where we were surprised to see the entire creek disappearing through a cobbly hole; bizarre. I soon wished I hadn’t brought my camera along because nearly the rest of the hike to the cave was in water and I would have much preferred to be swimming or floating some of the time. It was refreshing hiking through the water though. It was also nice to get some of Pyramid’s mud off me.
Soon we got to where the cave should be according to the topo map. Someone had mis-marked it though so we flailed around the hillside for a bit before finally stumbling upon it. It’s good that we did find it because A Nice Little Dorf Cave is a very cool cave. I entered the cave and found myself in nice walking canyon passage. The passage slit left and right. I went left. The left passage was mostly walking with a couple duck-unders for a couple hundred feet. The passage ended in flowstone. I got there first and Jeff found me at the top of the flowstone with my head cocked to the side listening. You could hear through a small hole at the top. There was no airflow but Jeff described the sound as the noise a large fan makes. Alan later assessed it as probably being far off water cascading a short distance into a large pool. I thought it might be worth hammering some of the protrusions around the hole. Assuming it opened a little larger soon it might be doable for a small person. It was certainly intriguing.
We routed back to the other passage and started down it. It split and we went left. It was really neat because the canyon floor began to drop out and soon it was a good 20 feet below me. I started to slide down and realized that it wouldn’t be easy to come back up. Then I worked my way back up to my previous rock perch. You could probably chimney across the top of the canyon but none of us attempted it. We went back to the split and went the other way into more walking canyon and to a room with a climb-up. There was a limestone knife protruding along the middle of the climb up. A real ball slicer. Jeff climbed up and I followed. Ahead the passage began to pinch and I bellied through a small hole to see the end. This section of cave reminded me a lot of Gemini. Jeff descended and I climbed up to what looked like an upper level lead. I got about 20 feet before the walking canyon pinched. Below, I checked out another lead but it ended in small alcoves. As we exited we passed E2 and soon were back at E1. Not long after we found the second cave, Dusty Dorf Cave.
It had a crawlway entrance to brief standing passage leading to a short climb up to a crawl. The highlight of the cave was a really cool northern long eared bat. Past him, the cave soon pinched. Jeff and I retreated and Alan spent a little more time documenting the cave. Then we hiked back to the cars. I had a chance to demonstrate my 4.5 mph walking speed on the road. Alan said he could barely keep up. If only there were hills nearby my house for me to climb maybe I’d be faster than Alan climbing too. I think I was only walking about 4 mph on my 3 mile walk last night. 4 mph is a comfortable pace.
Back at the cars we met Stewart and talked to him awhile before heading to Ryan’s for dinner. I was pretty talkative at Ryan’s. We headed back to Marion’s where Alan gave a slide show. He had some really neat pictures. I was rather unhappy that my body wanted so badly to sleep. Luckily, I was able to stay awake throughout the entire slide show. There were a couple cave photos that really caught my eye and of course many neat landscape pictures. Soon after the slide show I crashed on the couch. I didn’t sleep quite as well that night.
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By Brian Killingbeck © 2005
