Akumal diving day three: Vaca Ha and Tortuga

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Campana

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Messages
270
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Location
Wills Point, Texas
# of dives
500 - 999
Akumal Day 3—Vaca Ha and Tortuga

Vaca Ha (Sacred Cow) is in a locked gated area around 7 km from 307 on the Coba Road, which passes through the village of Tulum. Right after turning off 307, there is a store on the left that has groceries and liquor, where we stopped a few times for basics like candy, cookies, and chips. It isn’t Wally World, but it’ll do in a pinch. The man who owns Vaca Ha decided in 1999 that he wanted to “improve” the opening, so he got some dynamite and blew out the opening. It used to be a two by four foot hole, now it’s a twenty foot hole. It is sort of round, with a busted ladder going down, which Roberto fixed while we dove. The ladder is typical for these parts, made of tree branches and ropes, and cut with a Machete which assures a decidedly non OSHA approved point at the top of each leg, so that the diver can be maximally injured if and when he/she slips.

The hole is full of peat, which gets stirred up very easily but settles quickly. Roger instructed me to jump in and not move around. The line begins at the base of the ladder, and no primary reel is needed. There is a small passageway for 25 feet, and then there is a very large hallway. There are numerous decorations in the first 600 feet, then the cave changes to a fracture passage for 800 feet, according to Steve Gerrard’s excellent book.

The dive has beautiful pillars of limestone, in rooms. The halocline was very pronounced as usual. At one point, I was a little above the divers in front of me, which is a good policy to stay out of the obfuscating layer. I noticed L was at the level of the Halocline, and she appeared to be swimming on the surface of the water, though of course she wasn’t since we were totally underwater. Each fin stroke produced a double vortex, and there was a disturbance following her all the way. It was very cool and once again my tendency to hallucinate took over. There is a lot of flow stone in the cave. The flow stone takes many beautiful shapes.

This dive had begun at 9:22 and was a bit deeper than some on the trip, and we used Nitrox of around 34.4%, mixed the night before and provided for $20 extra per set of doubles. At 34 minutes, the dive was turned by M., and the total dive time was 67 minutes, a short dive for Akumal. By the time we finished, Roberto had the ladder all roped back together, but the exit was still difficult for anyone who had a sore leg, hip, overweight, or otherwise imperfect.

After lunch, we proceeded back to the same locked gate, and entered the property. When we saw the Vaca Ha hole, we bore left for a few meters til we found Tortuga (turtle). There is supposed to be a croc in the hole, which appears to be at the edge of a swamp. There is a low concrete wall around the Cenote, and there are gear tables which are handy. The entry is very easy as was the exit; a ladder is available. On the bottom of the Cenote, there are bones, probably croc leftovers. The cave line starts from the ladder. The decorations in this cave are brown, tan, white, and are very nice. I saw my first Gnome Garden in this cave, having some psychotic thinking hanging on from the morning. The gnomes were around 2’ tall, and tend to stand in groups. They have medieval clothing, pointed hats, and the obligatory long beards. They don’t do anything but sit and stare. There were also wizards, witches, horses, and other figures which are fashioned from stalagmites. There is a huge room in the cave which contains lots of large speleothems. We turned right at a “T” intersection and headed up a shallower tunnel until it turned left and choked down pretty sharply; at which point we turned around, probably because we didn’t want to get into a too-narrow area. This tunnel was the most unusual one on the trip. Some sort of black tarry looking stuff was all over the oval tunnel. It looked soft but felt hard. If you’ve ever been inside a smokehouse in Tennessee or Texas, you’ve seen a similar looking substance which is the tarry smoke residue. Yayo didn’t know what the stuff is, either, but suspects a tannin stain. It’s definitely black, however, not brown.

After the turn, I was close to thirds, and even though we were headed out, I signaled my fellow divers and called the dive. I did this because we had planned to possibly explore the other side of the “T” if we hadn’t hit thirds before we got there, I was in the rear, and felt the exit would be smoother if I went ahead and called it.

I banged my tanks on a restriction and after the dive I asked Yayo for some tips on my diving, which he answered only by saying to slow down through the restrictions in order to minimize any damage to the cave. After this, I slowed down to a snails pace, and in tight restrictions would nudge the top, not bang it. I want to add that I did not break anything, and to my knowledge, no one else did either. There are spots in all these caves where the decorations have been damaged. It is best in decorated areas to stay very close to the line unless there is plenty of space vertically and one is very sure of exact trim.

We completed a safety stop. The dive statistics were: sixty feet for 80 minutes, turned at 43 minutes and 2250 psi.
 
Dave,
Thanks for the detail you're including in your reports. I'm really enjoying reading them.

Larry
 
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