MikeFerrara
April 22nd, 2002, 02:02 PM
This was our first trip to Mine Lamotte. We received some good info from a friend who is in the process of doing a survey there, however, he hasn’t been there since the collapse. Part of the land bridge between the two pools collapsed. We arrived late on Saturday so we decided to wait until Sunday to dive. On our first dive we entered through the tunnel at the south end of the pool. Since this was our first dive here we planned to turn on fourths and only used back gas (no stages). We passed two Y’s and stayed to the right at each. Also, we each (two of us) placed a marker on the line we came in on. Since I don’t trust clothespins to stay where I put them we used arrows that have been cut and are just a rectangle. This provided a secure marker and didn’t risk placing contradictory directional info on the line. We also spotted at least two jumps but didn’t check them out. We’ll do that next time. There also were some rooms off to the sides of the road with no line going in. These, also, will be interesting to explore in the future. We turned the dive at 35 min. The max depth was 30ft and a total time of 68 min. Once we got back a ways vis was 20+.
On the second dive we entered next to the collapse. It looks like a good portion of the entrance was blocked but I didn’t see it before the collapse. There is still plenty of room to get in. The line does not extend to open water so we tied off outside and ran a line in. I was surprised to see a stop sign at the beginning of the permanent line. This was a shorter dive since we were using the same tanks. There isn’t any place to get fills closer than St. Lois. Bon Terr doesn’t fill din. We again passed two Y’s and just for the heck of it went right at each one. Vis wasn’t as good as the first dive but the terrain was more interesting. The line runs across some big rooms (as near as I could tell) creating a really neat effect in the limited vis. The dive was 39 min with a max depth of 54 ft. Mine Lamotte doesn’t have the unlimited vis and the scenery that some of the Florida caves have but lots of history and an enjoyable dive. I don’t think you would ever run out of nooks and crannies to explore. We’re headed back next week to dive on Sunday.
On the second dive we entered next to the collapse. It looks like a good portion of the entrance was blocked but I didn’t see it before the collapse. There is still plenty of room to get in. The line does not extend to open water so we tied off outside and ran a line in. I was surprised to see a stop sign at the beginning of the permanent line. This was a shorter dive since we were using the same tanks. There isn’t any place to get fills closer than St. Lois. Bon Terr doesn’t fill din. We again passed two Y’s and just for the heck of it went right at each one. Vis wasn’t as good as the first dive but the terrain was more interesting. The line runs across some big rooms (as near as I could tell) creating a really neat effect in the limited vis. The dive was 39 min with a max depth of 54 ft. Mine Lamotte doesn’t have the unlimited vis and the scenery that some of the Florida caves have but lots of history and an enjoyable dive. I don’t think you would ever run out of nooks and crannies to explore. We’re headed back next week to dive on Sunday.