Holmes Creek report

[Dive-aholic]

So I finally got out to Holmes Creek with SuPrBuGmAn/Mat this past weekend. I've been wanting to see some of the caves out there for some time and Mat was able to make it over on a weekend I was free. I picked Mat up at JB with the boat in tow and we headed west arriving at the boat launch about an hour later. After moving all the gear from the van into the boat, we set off for the short ride up the creek to the spring we were planning to dive. We got to the spring and couldn't see anything. The water level was up enough to cause a lot of tannins to infiltrate it. Fortunately, Mat has been here before so he knew exactly where the entrance was. We tried to follow him down along the bottom, but quickly lost sight of him and ended up having to surface to look for his bubbles. Vis in the basin was less than 5'! Once we regrouped, we descended down to a tree stump Mat had tied off a reel to so we could find the entrance. We followed the line into the cave (wouldn't have know we were there other than the reel line being tied off to the main line). We went in what looked like a rather small entrance into a smaller passage. There was still some basin water intrusion here so visibility wasn't the greatest. Once we were about 20-30' in (I think) the water cleared up quite a bit. It was also so much warmer in the cave than in the basin. I thought the temperature was in the 70s, but it was only 69. What a difference it was though! The basin water must have been in the high 50s! We went through a small restriction and came to the first T where we turned right to take a look at this:



After spending about a minute or two in there, we turned back and headed the other direction on the T. We came to another T and took the main passage line to continue our penetration. The cave is very low and silty. Even great technique won't keep the passage from silting up a bit. Mat did great though. I was 2nd and was still able to see the passage most of the way. We penetrated about 15 minutes, maybe 500', before we popped up into a larger room (by comparison). It was only about 7-8' tall, maybe twice as wide, and 3 times as long. Mat turned the dive here. It was his farthest penetration in this cave. We had just come through a very low, silty part of the passage and we both knew we were heading out in zero visibility. There was a bit of current in this cave so we ended up exiting all the way to the 2nd T in near zero visibility with the silt following us the entire way. I knew this was going to happen. I actually move at a decent pace in zero visibility and ended up waiting a couple of minutes for Mat to catch up once I got to the 2nd T where we had some visibility. As I waited for Mat, with my hand on the line to feel his movement along it I could see the silt pouring out of the restriction with the water movement into the room I was in. It pretty much stopped there, though because this was a larger room with a couple of offshoots where the silt could go, so we ended up exiting the rest of the way with some decent visibility. We got to the beginning of the line and into the cold water and slowly made our way to the surface. Max depth was 64' and no decompression obligation was incurred.

Here are some shots (although not as good as Mat's) of the surface:





As you can see it was an overcast day, but we didn't get rained on.

After heading back to the launch and stowing our gear in the van, we decided to head out to another spring just to check it out topside. We drove over to another launch and set the boat in the water. We headed down the creek over to the Choctowhatchee River, heading upstream first to make sure the motor would move us against the river current. After confirming that, we turned around and headed downstream. After about 25 minutes we reached the spring run and head in to go take a look. My outboard was having some issues on the way over, sounding like it was bogging down more and more, but still running okay as we were going. It was getting worse the closer we got. As we entered the basin, it wasn't sounding too good, but there were a couple of other boaters we had seen earlier there also having problems. One of them has a motor that wouldn't go into anything but reverse. Mat even heard him say the motor wouldn't go into reverse when they launched it and now it wasn't going into forward gear! As we pulled in, we hit a stump and it popped my motor up. I was putting it back down when I lost a ring off my finger. I just got this ring from my grandfather (his wedding ring) a couple of weeks ago and haven't had time to get it sized. I folded up my pant legs and got out of the boat to look for it, ended up slipping a few times and getting soaked. Mat and Jen ended up finding the ring and we recovered it (phew!!!), but I was already soaked by that time. I ended up wearing Jen's tight jacket on the trip out. As we were leaving, the other group was also on the way out with the one boat moving backwards! During the trip out, my motor continued to act up. I finally realized I had forgotten to add oil to it when I gassed up just prior to heading out that morning. Doh! This is the first 2 stroke I've owned and I guess I'm going to have to put an idiot sign on it that says, "Add oil, Dummy!" I quickly added some oil (it sits in the boat right next to the gas container (another doh!), and it seemed to start working better. Then it started acting up again. I added a little bit more oil, but I think the damage was already done. Suddenly the motor seized! We were still a ways from the creek and moving upstream! Not good!!! Fortunately, the other boaters were right behind us, one towing the other. They graciously offered to tow us to the cut off and get us out of the current so I could use the trolling motor to get us back to the launch.

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They got us back and we trolled back to the launch in near darkness. We loaded up the boat and headed back east to drop Mat off at the hotel. Jen and I opted out of dinner because we were both beat and ready to just crash out at home.

Here are some photos of the basin off the Choctowhatchee:



This one shows elevation you don't normally see in Florida:



It was a great day, incidents and all. We were also very lucky. I got my ring back. We got towed back to the creek. And we had a great time diving and seeing new river and springs. I tore down my outboard yesterday and got the motor to turn. I just need to replace the pistons and all will be well, so the motor isn't totally fried! It should be back in the water better than ever in a week.

Thanks, Mat, for showing us these new spots and hopefully the incidents won't keep you from coming out with us again! I can assure you I won't forget to add oil to the fuel ever again!!!

[ShagMan]

Classic shot of the three-boat caravan! That boat needs a more powah anyway!!

Love the shot of the bones... one of these days I'm gonna get my certs in order and come visit places like that more often... the trip down that bedding plane for the first time was not for the faint of heart tho! I want to go back when it's low, just to take my camera and get some shots of the ledge and basin, it was pretty last summer.

Thanks for the report, very entertaining.

[SuPrBuGmAn]

LOL, I saved the boat train picture to my computer, CLASSIC.

The waterways on this side of the Chipola have a wide variety of cave. The one we dove is low, silty, with white limestone; the one we just looked at is big, dark, high flow, and mostly sand bottom, and another one further north has relatively white limestone, light colored sand, no silt, and high flow, while being very narrow.

I'm looking forward to diving more on the Chipola as well though, I know they will vary just as much! Gonna scout out a few this weekend hopefully!

Great report Rob! Thanks for the boat ride, I had a great dive, hope I didn't cut it too short for ya - still a new kind of cave diving for me. Give that other spring a go when you get that motor back in order! Its WELL worth it.

[Dive-aholic]

I've been in 3 Chipola River caves so far and they are all very different from each other. It's pretty amazing how different they can all be. Heck, look at the caves on the Mill Pond. Not too much in common there either. Just the main 3 are very different.

You didn't cut it too short, Mat. As we were coming through that last low spot before you turned it I was thinking about exactly how far I wanted to push it before turning. I knew at that point that most of the exit would be on the line. Motor should be back up within a week. I'm hoping to head out to that other spring by the end of the month.

[TSandM]

Just out of curiosity, if you were exiting in zero viz, why weren't you in touch contact? That's what I was taught . . . I think I'd have an anxiety attack if I were exiting along the line, and had no idea if my buddy was still behind me or not.

[Dive-aholic]

It would have been real difficult in this cave to try to exit in touch contact. In these types of caves you're pretty much diving solo, even if you're with a buddy. Remember, we're in sidemount, so air sharing isn't a big issue at this point. When I got back to the junction room, I waited with my fingers on the line and could feel Mat making progress out. If we had penetrated a lot farther, I would have stopped sooner. There's an old technique called a bump & go that isn't taught by everyone these days but is still used by people. Had the exit been longer we would have used that method. It's much faster and works great when you don't have to depend on someone else for air sharing anyway. It's just a different type of diving. You have to do what works. I don't think touch contact would work in the small, low passages of this particular cave. It would only hinder the exit.

[SuPrBuGmAn]

We had actually discussed the dive before hand, I had been there once before and knew we'd be exitting in zero visibility. We turned in order, and there was no confusion as to where we were. Its low passage and its much safer to traverse, at this point, with a hand on the line and a hand keeping you from knocking your head on something. Delicate cave and a fine silt floor demand that keep in good form(often difficult in tight passage while trying to keep on a line as well as touch contact). This was just a bump and go scenario, with this limited of a penetration, we basically had contact when we turned, and back again at the end of the low passage. Had I been obviously late, a tremendous amount of silt and disturbed cave came flowing out, or something curious happens to the line(you can feel a buddy on the same line from quite a distance); I would have, and I'm SURE Rob would have been there to assist in short order. In the configurations we were diving(sidemount), most things can be dealt with on your own. I still preffer to dive with a buddy, admittedly, but certain situations can become worse with a crowd.

Just be sure that we knew we'd be in zero vis, and we knew we'd be making our way out a short distance without direct contact. I could feel him on the line, and I hadn't run over him, so I knew he was in front of me

[SuPrBuGmAn]

I'm slow with the reply, ack.

[denisegg]

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Pics like this is the reason this is called the Redneck Riviera

[SuPrBuGmAn]

Atleast they were friendly. The alternative would have been drifting south to the next boat launch and calling YOU to come pick us up!