by Beyond Mammoth Cave- A Tale of Obsession in the World's Longest Cave (epub)
“I figure it’s about a mile to Northtown Cave,” I said. “There’s no way this passage can stop.”
I turned back toward the pool, taking in a large breath and bellowing into the unknown. We heard a long succession of echoes that trailed away into an eerie silence. In movies, caves always echo like a large tiled bathroom. Real caves seldom produce echoes unless conditions are just right. We repeated the echo experiment with different toned hoots. A staccato burst of three tones would return a sustained musical chord. Such perfect acoustical conditions were almost always caused by extensive areas of ponded water that formed a reflective surface for sound waves. We resisted the temptation to continue in this wonderful passage. In fact, it almost seemed anticlimactic. We knew that the ultimate length of this passage would exceed anything we could explore today. It was very late and a long way to the surface. We turned heels and reached the top after twenty-four hours underground.
A few months earlier, in August 1979, two survey parties had retraced the explorations of Ron Gariepy and Bill Eidson in the North Crouchway. With me leading one party and Jim Currens the other, we orchestrated a leapfrog survey north into the newly found passages. The purpose was to maximize surveying productivity. One party commences a survey while the other advances an arbitrary number of stations, such as twenty bends in the passage. At that point, the second party starts its survey. When the first party joins its survey to the second party’s initial point, the first party leapfrogs the second party by counting twenty bends to start a third segment of survey.
Both Jim and I knew how to count during a leapfrog survey so as to get to survey the most desirable cave, so we tried to position ourselves most favorably for the best segment. I won this one. Pete Crecelius, Geary Schindel, and I surveyed a continuous string of Z Survey stations through over a mile of cave. Jim Currens, Bill Walter, and Chris Welsh cleared just under three thousand feet. They ran out of cave at the breakdown that had halted the original explorers. Still, not bad. Our two parties had logged over eight thousand feet of passage, all of it the low, wide elliptical tubes that were characteristic of this northern area of the cave. These passages were dry, often of crawling height, and more often than not floored with sharp-edged rimstone that wears out cavers. Tough cave, but nevertheless a fine discovery. Unfortunately, however, all these passages ended in ugly, wet sandstone collapse under the flanks of Toohey Ridge. Leads were scarce, and what leads we did find did not encourage us.
When Jim’s party reached the breakdown that had halted Bill Eidson and Ron Gariepy, they were dismayed by having run out of cave. Although Bill Walter had been able to squeeze through an unbelievably tiny hole to find a continuation of the main passage, no one else in the party could get through. The lead would have to wait. On the way back, they shoved into every likely hole, looking for the discovery that eluded them. Vertical shafts with falling water hinted of lower levels, but the shafts’ unreachable floors were full of rock, blocking any drains. The group was soon back in the main Z Survey line where a low parallel crouchway led off to the east, blowing air. Since it was close and paralleled the passage they had been surveying earlier in the day, it did not seem promising; it would likely lead to the same breakdown that had interrupted their previous passage.
Resolute, they began a D Survey into this side passage, drumming up their reserve energies. Within a few stations, they were crawling along on their bellies, wheezing in the dry dust kicked up from the floor. Every now and then they could rise onto their hands and knees, but only briefly. Soon, Bill Walter smoked “D10” on the wall of a larger canyon that cut across the crawl. The tired cavers ended their survey at this point; it was a good place to quit and begin the long slog out to the surface. Bill, never satisfied, looked briefly in each direction. Lots of sand fill one way, dripping water the other; both ways went on.
My party was sitting near the entrance of the D Survey side passage when Jim’s party emerged.
“Anything?” I asked.
“Well, sorta,” Jim answered. “We followed this passage for ten stations to an intersection with a large canyon.”
I perked up. “A canyon?”
“Looks like it is heading to shafts.”
“Oh.” I shrugged back down.
Shafts often spelled doom for horizontal passages like these. From our experience, shafts that provided a route to more cave tended to be the exception rather than the rule, contrary to local caving lore.
Disappointment. We discussed what we had found, agreeing that although nothing stopped, nothing was very exciting, either. We had explored nearly two miles of cave out here, and it seemed to be just a big bust. A route to nowhere. We sat there lamenting our bad fortune. Poisoned in spirit by our negativity now and dead tired, we began the long crawl back to the surface.
A few weeks later, Pete Crecelius, Bill Walter, and I returned with a newly recruited horde of Canadian cavers who had traveled south from McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario. They had rented an enormous van, taken out most of the seats, and crammed eight people and all their gear inside—geology students. We were also joined by Miles Drake, one of the D.C. cavers I had recruited. We were determined to make this unpromising part of the cave go somewhere.
Pete Crecelius was the newest hard-core caver addition to the CKKC. He was a blessing to our efforts in Toohey Ridge. Bill Walter had introduced him to the caves of Toohey Ridge, having met him while surveying in the caves north of the Green River in Mammoth Cave National Park. Pete was driven by the same greed for discovery that drove the rest of us. Probably it was this obsession that also made him one of our most productive contributors at Toohey Ridge.
Soon we were back in the cave again, at the end of the North Crouchway through which only Bill Walter had previously been able to pass. An energetic bout of breakdown hammering by Pete enlarged the tight spot so the rest of us could get through. Our large parties measured out fifteen hundred feet of cave survey, but once again nothing went. There was just more mud and breakdown as the upper-level tube ran to an end in breakdown and fill beneath the surface of a deep valley.
Several hours later, we arrived at the entrance of the D Survey, sweating after the strenuous three-quarter-mile duck-walk in the North Crouchway. I was spent, and the Canadians were drooping. Two-thirds of the party were routed and aching to get back to the surface and home. Miles, Bill, and Pete, still energetic, decided they might as well look at the end of the D Survey. Bill recalled that it looked as though shafts were just ahead, but he knew it would be a long time before anyone would return to what seemed to be marginal leads at best.
I gathered my newly formed party of the weary souls and departed. Remaining behind, Miles, Bill, and Pete refilled their carbide lamps and set aside cave packs and flashlights. They would be minimally equipped for maximum speed, and their short supply of light would almost guarantee discovery of something, according to superstition.
With a wry grin, Pete queried his party. “Well, do we have our three sources of light?”
“Of course,” Bill answered in his most serious tone. “We have yours, that’s one; Miles’s, that’s two; and mine—that makes three.”
“Yup, three sources,” Pete agreed.
Miles, wide-eyed in mock horror, said, “Boy, you guys are really unsafe. I might have to report you to the NSS!”
All three of them laughed.
A primary caving rule is that each explorer shall carry three sources of light. No, they were not following the rule; but they would all stay together (most of the time), and they were seasoned veterans who (usually) left little to chance. They were taking a risk, but a risk was sometimes what it took to make that big discovery.
Well-rested now, Pete followed the D Survey—Kris Krawl, Jim Currens had christened it. Ten stations, to reach the end of the survey, should not be far.
Pete crawled through the low, wide tube, slowly passing the sooted station numbers. Ten stations was far. Finally he saw D10 labeled on the distant wall. However, be
tween him and the wall lay a deep canyon that cut across the passage they had been traveling.
“Hey guys! Take a look at this!” he yelled.
The canyon was far larger than he had imagined. He climbed down into it, feet pressed against each wall for support. There was no need to climb all the way down; there were plenty of ledges to move along at the widest level. The canyon was still quite deep below them. Miles struggled to keep up, but Bill was right on Pete’s heels.
Pete paused at one particularly wide spot to make sure no one needed assistance. Rapidly dripping water—which Bill had heard on the previous trip—had dissolved away the ledge along one wall. Getting past the obstacle required a balancing move against gravity as the slippery walls afforded practically no purchase. Pete reached out a hand to the others at just the right moment. This was no place to have an accident by letting pride get in the way of common sense. Bill and Miles made the scary leap across the void to the ledge on the far side.
They moved east down the open canyon. For the last several hundred feet, both the ledges they were following, as well as the ceiling, were gradually descending. The canyon was actually a series of bell-shaped rooms connected by narrower areas. On the map, it looked like beads on a necklace.
After one particularly difficult climb down where the bell-shaped rooms descended even more steeply, they found a large room. There was no apparent way on; this seemed to be the last bead in the chain. The main way filled around the next corner. However, this was not the end; a number of small holes led down through the floor. But reality began to catch up with the party. They were very far from the entrance—and from their packs.
They sat down and discussed their options. Was it better to go on, or should they save these leads for a later trip? They had already traversed the equivalent of a full day’s survey to this point from Station D10 at the end of Kris Krawl. Only greedy cave rapers who would steal caving fruits without paying the survey price would go farther. But how could they stop? Was the way on worthwhile? Was it even possible?
“Hey, quiet!” Pete said.
They froze.
“Listen. Do you hear that?”
They strained their ears. After a few seconds, they heard a distant sound. Far below-and above the sound of their own beating hearts—they heard the telltale rumble of running water.
“Its a stream! Let’s go!”
They climbed rapidly down into the narrow, sinuous canyons beneath the large room and squeezed around tight corners, each following a different route. In short order and more or less at the same time, they met on the same ledge, their feet dangling over open space.
“Wow! Take a look at this!” Miles said, his mouth agape.
A wide passage with black walls led off below. A glistening stream flowed through a broad and deep canyon in the floor.
Pete had already climbed most of the way to the floor twenty feet below. Miles was close behind. They moved downstream.
After just two hundred feet, an immense wall of breakdown reached from floor to ceiling, apparently blocking this wonderful passage.
“Shit!” Pete yelled.
The last thing expected this low in the system was breakdown. They had descended at least a hundred feet since D10, far below the lowest reaches of any valley wall. They stood in disappointment and disbelief.
Finally, Bill said, “Pete look at this.” He pointed at the wall of rocks. “This isn’t sandstone; it’s limestone.”
Pete inspected the pile. “Hey, you’re right. I don’t know what we have, but it isn’t a surface break! We can find our way though this.”
He picked his way up the pile, spirits lifted, looking for openings. Bill and Miles sat exhausted at the foot of the pile.
Pete paused, looking back at the party hopefully.
“You go on. We’ll wait here,” Bill said. “See if you can make this thing go.”
Pete climbed up to the ceiling where he saw a likely looking gap behind a large, flat piece of rock leaning against the left wall. He slid in on his side, his chest facing the wall, his left shoulder against the slab. He dragged his body along by grabbing doorknob-shaped chunks of chert on the main wall. Sharp rocks on the floor poked into his ribs. After twenty feet, he reached a closet-sized room with a small, triangular-shaped hole at the far end. Through it was blackness. He crammed his body through the narrow slot, nearly falling headfirst into the void.
As his eyes adjusted to the black gloom, Pete examined his surroundings. Enormous black slabs of rock lay everywhere. The ceiling, floor, and both walls consisted of these rocks—a breakdown chamber. This was a large void, but he was obviously still in the main breakdown zone.
The only way on was through a low, horizontal squeeze between two flat slabs of rocks. He belly-crawled for fifteen feet to where he could climb down onto a wide ledge.
Blackness!
He had made it through. The passage resumed as before.
Just for good measure, Pete went about two hundred feet down this fine virgin passage, walking on wide ledges eight feet above the swiftly moving stream. At a large bend to the right, he was at last satisfied that this passage was not going to end anytime soon. He collected about a dozen encyclopedia-sized rocks and built a cairn, then removed his carbide lamp and shook it to get a longer flame. Response was slow—not much carbide remained—but the flame grew longer. With the two-inch yellow flame, he smoked his initials on top of the cairn: PWC—10/79. One rock below, he added an arrow that pointed the way back toward known cave. Some future explorer might one day come from the opposite direction. Then he hurried back through the breakdown to join the rest of his party.
The trio returned to where they had left their packs, their tiny flames in their lamps barely lighting the way. They changed carbide and started back toward the surface.
Pete Crecelius, Bill Walter, and Miles Drake emerged at dawn, and soon everyone was talking about this new discovery. Wow! A new river flowing away from Roppel Cave. I quizzed the three of them, debriefing each about every facet of the trip. I yearned to relive all of their experiences.
This was the biggest discovery in many months, maybe the biggest discovery since Bill Walter and Jim Currens had discovered Arlie Way. But where did it go? As with any major open-ended lead, the inevitable grand predictions came next, everybody contributing his own. It was not so much a matter of what was discovered but what might be discovered.
Such predictions were further enhanced by the aura of a remote, mysterious place, and Pete’s river discovery was certainly remote. Many miles and many hours of difficult caving lay between it and the Roppel Entrance. The average travel time from the Roppel Entrance through the S Series along Bill Walter and Jim Currens’s discovery route to Arlie Way was about two hours. The traverse to the beginning of Kris Krawl, about a mile up the knee-crushing rimstone of the North Crouchway, required another two hours. To reach Pete’s initials at the limit of his penetration beyond the big breakdown took an hour and a half from the North Crouchway. Six hours from the surface—six hours if one was fresh. On the return trip to the surface, when one or more members of the party hovered at the threshold of exhaustion, travel time would stretch to eight hours. The final obstacle after the rigors of the S Series to within just a few hundred feet of the entrance was an ascent of 140 feet by way of two rope climbs and a chimney up through a narrow slot. In the winter, a cold wind howled in from the surface, adding chilling misery to an already often-broken spirit and body. Nearly always, the first of the cavers who made it out would quickly fall asleep on the ground, no matter what the temperature.
After everyone was finally topside came the obligatory untying and coiling of the rope used for the forty-foot entrance drop. Cold hands then fumbled with the padlock, hidden behind a steel plate inside the gate. A lock located where only one hand can reach it through a small armhole helps prevent unwanted break-ins but gives rise to wailing curses when one tries to unlock or, worse, lock it.
Finally came the mile walk bac
k to the field station. It was usually pitch dark and often foggy in the predawn hours. The weary procession of tattered cavers often would be scattered on the route, which sometimes resulted in their getting lost. Cavers unfamiliar with the mind-numbing confusion of sinks and valleys between the cave and the field station might wander around for hours trying to find their way home to warmth and bed. Trips were hell.
Part of the attraction and challenge of the caves in Toohey Ridge, and specifically of Roppel Cave, was this very hellishness. With a single entrance and the intrinsic hardships of the routes to reach unexplored passageways, Roppel Cave was most difficult. But at the farthest extremes of the system, we were turning up promising walking passage. The D.C. cavers had a passion for this difficulty. When the news of the river discovery reached them, they immediately devised plans of how to attack this new and obviously promising lead.
Coincidentally, Chris Welsh, Bob Anderson, and Linda Baker had been planning a small underground camp in Arlie Way to overcome the rigors of the S Survey. This bivouac could be used as a base for exploration of the many leads reachable via Arlie Way. It would save the long travel time and energy lost going to and from the entrance. On the trip during which Pete Crecelius had discovered the new river, I had carried one of Chris’s supply packs overstuffed with camp provisions. From the Roppel Entrance, I delivered it to the junction of Arlie Way in preparation for setting up the advance camp.
The timing could not have been better. The camp was now half stockpiled, and a wonderful lead pointed into the unknown. It was far in and the journey would be difficult, but fabulous discoveries likely awaited the explorers. The great prospects were sufficient enough to dissipate all doubt about whether the camp was worth it: this camp plan was perfect.
Camping in a cave is serious business and a stout test of spirit. One can never carry in enough supplies. Some major item will always be inadvertently omitted. Everything needed for the camp had to be hauled through a stretch of cave that one could barely squirm through. And even the absolute certainty of discovery is sometimes not enough to offset the depression that usually accompanies in-cave camping. European and Mexican cavers agree that cavers should not camp in a cave unless there is no alternative. Everything is damp in caves; just keeping warm is a real effort.