Cave Trip 2-20 thru 2-22-9

2-20-9

The alarm went off at 4AM and I hopped out of bed to finish packing up all my stuff for the extended weekend. The dive gear was pretty much ready to go, just needed to put my primary light back together and pack clothes, towels, cameras, couple books, and some food for the trip. Dale made it to my house a little before 6AM and we were on the road shortly afterwards.

Met up with GlenFWB and Shagman at Cave Adventurers for some fills and Shag rented a primary light. It was busy, and we were there at 8:30AM. I figured we'd be in and out on a weekday, especially early, but they had a line before us so our departure didn't happen for 2 hours or so. Not that we didn't have anything to do, we talked cave diving with Edd and each other, so the time passed quickly. Once loaded back up, we all headed East.

Madison Springs



We got to Madison and signed up, nobody else was even at the park. It was 1:30PM and we were glad to see the basin was still blue, albeit a bit milky. The river had been rising all week and I was afraid the spring would go under(its notorious for being the first to get blown). Took a little walk to check out Martz Sink and show Glen and Shag where the alternative entrance to the system was located.



It was time to gear up and get everything to the water. Glen and Shag would be doing a cavern dive and Dale and I would be venturing into the cave. I ran a primary and dropped O2 in the basin before running into the Rabbit Hole and up to the goldline. At this point, Dale took the lead and we headed upstream. I was familiar with the jump to the Godzilla Room and Dale showed me where the jump to Marz was located. We continued down the gold to the Mount Offshoot and took it just shy of Potters Delight and turned in order to save some time for some other tunnels. We backtracked to Martz tunnel and I jumped off and we headed into the large room below the sinkhole, which was suprisingly large. I took a peak up Martz and we turned back towards the mainline again. The cave from Martz back had trannic intrusion, visibility was 15-20' with a yellow tinge. Everything further back was crystal clear and noticably warmer. We took the Godzilla jump and completed the circuit, which is always necessary at Madison, atleast once per trip. Spent a couple minutes in the basin on O2 and ended the dive with a max depth of 87' for a total time of 110 minutes. Shagman and Glen were putzing around in the basin by that time as well and I got a turtle thrown at me.

Met JAMIE MCG on the surface after they completed a cave dive. Always great to meet other board members.

After gearing down and getting dry, we crossed the river and started criss-crossing a bunch of dirt roads, failing a few times to find our target. We did find an interesting dry sink, but our persistance eventually paid off and we found the spring we were looking for off the river. Unfortunately the river was flooded over it, although it was still springing. We didn't have time to dive it anyway, still nice to know where it is for a possible future outing.



Cmufieldhockey had the hookup on a trailer in the Luraville area, which we took full advantage of. She joined us that night, making it by 10:30-11PM after a day of work. Shinanigans insued and we found out Glen's favorite movie is Dreamcatcher.

2-21-9

Saturday morning came around early and we had decided that we'd be diving Blue Hole. Our wetsuits were hanging outside overnight and I was quite unpleasantly suprised to find icesycles hanging off the legs and arms and the entire suit frozen over... We headed to Dive Outpost, started a tab, and started getting fills. The five of us, headed over to one of the State Parks just south-east and signed in at the ranger station and began unloading gear. Luckily the day was warming quickly! I brought a dolly for this dive because I knew it'd be a long walk to the spring we'd be diving; somewhere between a quarter and a third of a mile. The trail was good, consisting of boardwalk and hard packed dirt and limestone, so it was an easy haul, especially with wheels. Here's a shot Stasia snagged of me(actually on the way out at this point, but whateva).



The spring looked great though, crystal clear water, slight boil, another spring run feeding into the basin from somewhere else with clear water. Lots of long eel grass and bass and bream in abundance. There was a nice blue hole situated right in the middle which is where we'd be ascending. There's a boardwalk with steps right to the water, lots of bench space and handrails too. Very nice!



Shagman and GlenFWB hit the water first while Dale, cmufieldhockey, and I finished up with our gear and joined them. Shagman ran a line down from OW and around the first room in the cavern, then down the second room of the cavern to the mainline. Made it easy for me to follow and tie into, since I had no idea where the mainline even started - LOL. The basin was awesome with sunlight just pouring into the first room. The second room was large and also quite nice, lots of interesting features in the ceiling and walls. The line starts just under a low bedding plane that stretches for 50' or less. We zipped under it with ease(the 3 of us cave diving were all in sidemount configurations) and the bedding plane just opens up to another big room with goethite, more striations in the walls, clay banks, and all kinds of more interesting features. At the bottom, the line zips through another restriction. I tried going through it first, but didn't make any progress. Stasia popped right through it and there was another big room just beyond. The bottom on the other side was sand , so I unhooked a tank and supermaned through. While I was getting my crap back together on the other side, Dale zipped right through without any issues. He's just as big as me(if not bigger), so I was a little annoyed at myself for not positioning myself correctly to get through without whipping tanks off. Anyway, this room was nice also, and a good medium size. The tunnel trended a little deeper and took a more conduit appearance and the bottom turned to a white clay silt. This tunnel opened up into another great big room with a HUGE white clay mount in the center. There was a bedding plane off to the side with the same white clay, it looked like a fresh snowfall! Some much variation in this cave in such a short distance. The cave went a little bit further and ended in a tall fissure at around 580'p. We took our time on the way out just enjoying the small details in each room. I ended up popping through the tight restriction with ease this time around, LOL. No gear removal necessary. We met back up with Shag and Glen in the cavern and eventually made a slow ascent, safety stop, and exit. There was another team waiting for us to exit(I guess there's a one team policy in place on the site). The trip back was easy and the day had gotten warm. Hit a max depth of 86' for a dive lasting 70 minutes.

We didn't have a tremendous amount of time, so opted out of Peacock today(we'd do it on Sunday) and headed to Little River, which was closer. Suprisingly, there just wasn't many people there. I figured a nice Saturday would have the place incredibly crowded. Things were just going our way.



Cmufieldhockey and I made a couple trips to get our gear down to the spring(Dale sat this one out) and then we hit the water. There was alot of filamentous algae growing, something I didn't remember seeing on my last two visits to this site. Flow was down and we headed in, I tied off to the rebar and zipped down to the goldline, where I let cmu set lead and set the pace for the dive. We were diving off the same tanks as our previous dive and just wanted to get a 2nd relaxing dive in to finish off the day. Thats exactly what we got too! We made it to the big Dorf in no time and headed up the Serpentine Tunnel, then into the Florida Room, nearly to the back. On the way back, we took the Merry Go Round Tunnel, then enjoyed a relaxing exit out(as opposed to Little Rivers normal firehose exits). Spent a bit of time deco'ing out(forgot to set my computer for O2 deco - LOL) and exitted with a max depth of 100' and a dive time of 67 minutes. Visibility was great at around 50'.

We made it back to Dive Outpost in time for fills and then back to the trailer to scarf down some of cmu's home made chilli!! We'd be gassing it up the next day though - LOL. Watched "The Cave" finally and laughed our assess off at exploding rebreathers, scooters, and all variations of cave gophers the movie could throw at us. Good entertainment. It was easy to fall asleep Saturday night.

2-22-9

Sunday morning wasn't nearly as cold, but I wasn't in as much of a hurry to get up. I pulled my wetsuit in(not frozen today!) to dry up and scarfed down a donut or two. We eventually all stirred and made our way to Peacock Springs State Park. cmufieldhockey headed out with her original cave instructor to dive at Madison so me and Dale were going to dive Peacock III while Shagman and GlenFWB would dive the caverns at Orange Grove and Peacock I. Peacock III was actually springing(it usually siphons), so that good. Peacock II looked good as well. Duckweed covered Peacock I and Waterhole III(all photos listed respectively below).









I ran a line from OW in PIII and into the cavern, checking out the back of the cavern, before heading off into the cave on the right and tieing into the goldline. The cave itself reminds me of the rest of the Peacock caves, just no flow, and very silty. Lots of side passages and offshoots. There was a neat vertical fissure in the ceiling that had left some debri on the floor as well as another small vent leaking sand on the floor and milky water into the water column. We passed a great big sand/clay mound in one room, it was impressive, leading all the way up from the floor to a crack in the ceiling. Visibility was around 15-25' for most of the dive, but there was a room or two with visibility ~40-50'. The room ontop of Henley's Castle was one of them. Very cool room, very large, lots of projections and features to look at. We followed the goldline just a bit further, where it turns to white, then goes under a lower passage into another nicely sized room. I turned the dive there and we made an uneventfull exit. Had a max depth of 61' for a dive lasting 70 minutes.

Spent some time walking around the various springs and sinks in the park and talked to Jamie MCG again. He had left a reel in place for us at our request on Friday. Originally hoped to do the Grand Traverse, but timing changed our plans up. We thanked him for leaving it for us regardless. After a little more time, Glen and Shag exitted Peacock I after there second dive of the day. We all geared down and headed back to the trailer to eat lunch, clean up a bit and head home. It was a great weekend.

Dale and I stopped by another spring on the way back. Conditions looked favorable but Dale opted to wait till next trip to dive it so we could get back home at a decent hour.



It was an awesome weekend with a bunch of great buddies. Saw a couple new divesites and scouted a few more for future trips. We got some great dives in and couldn't stop laughing when we were dry. I hope its not too long before we can all do it again!

Awesome Trip report and pictures Matt! Oh, the envy.

This picture makes my back hurt just looking at it - must be the grandpa thing
Looks like you had a lot of fun - thanks for the report.

SuPrBuGmAn:

2-21-9

Click to expand...

It really wasn't too bad with the dolly!

Haven't had time to process the pictures...got some good shots to post. Mat's post left a few important details out...I will be glad to share them later.

But I have to say for the record....the movie "Dreamcatchers" was NOT my idea. Holy smokes...what a bad movie! Thanks Shagman for the excellent choice.
Although it wasn't a comedy...we sure laughed a lot!

The movie poster for Dreamcatcher made my day

Look at those eyebrows!!!


I'll try to post a trip report later, Mat had to out-do us by getting his report up first

No pics from me, we'll have to rely on Glen for documentation of the in-water entertainment this time!

Oh, and that wasn't a concrete chunk in my belt at Little River, that was a custom ditchable weight device!!!

lol what a great description of an awesome weekend! The cave with the white clay was absolutely gorgeous and it felt like we were flying through snow covered mountains. Very serene. I'm so taking a camera next time I get in there.

There's always a ton of laughter when the three amigos get together- even some underwater laughing this time too! I thoroughly enjoyed every wet and dry minute of the weekend. Even better, I dove with such great group of gentlemen this weekend that not a dive passed where I didn't have somebody else carrying/pulling one or both of my tanks! :blinking:

As mentioned I dove Madison on Sunday with an old friend and his student. The river had risen the last few days a couple feet and it was tanic (although not blown out) till the Martz jump. We did a slow relaxed 60 some minute dive up the main line to half hitch, and the student finished up some skills to complete his full cave class.

Perfect weekend, guys.

If I could change one thing, it would have been to have no frozen wetsuits! But yeah, it was perfect otherwise!