Posted: Tue Apr 20, 2004 1:29 pm
Canyoneering...or is it caving...or what at Muir Valley???
A tale: While scouting for new routes, Jared Hancock and Karla Caradang recently discovered a cave in the Valley with bear prints and skat nearby. (We understand they do range through the area, but don't stick around.) Like most RRG caves, this one is not long --only about 35 feet deep -- but is unusual inasmuch as it has a very tall ceiling -- about 75 feet high. The entrance is only about 10 feet high by 6 feet wide. Inside the cave is a trickling waterfall, and about 15 feet away is a beautiful dry maybe-climbable dihedral (sport.)
Jared has marked this dihedral as a project and will be bolting it soon. A 70 foot climb inside a cave!!
The most curious feature can be seen when you lean into the dihedral wall. Near the top of the 75 foot ceiling is a faint glow of light, coming in from god knows where above.
With Jared's blessing, I grabbed a rope and some gear and headed up to the top to see if I could find the opening where the light was coming in. After an hour of scrambling and bushwhacking through the Great Eastern Kentucky Rhododendron Jungle, I found a tiny dark hole and yelled through it. Sure, enough they could hear me in the cave. The hole was barely big enough to wiggle through. But, not knowing if it squeezed down more, I continued to look for another opening. After rapping down a big dihedral about 12 feet to a ledge, I found another opening, not much bigger but looking a little less gloomy.
Although, they could hear me yell through the opening, everything I threw down, didn't drop to the cave floor -- including the rope. We guessed that the 60 meter rope was long enough and was just getting hung up in the upper caverns.
So, I anchored the rope and lowered down into the hole with only one prusik rope if I had to retreat up. I've never liked the idea of caving, but this was too cool to pass up. The cavern snaked down through the rock and opened up instead of closing down. In a few minutes I was hanging above the waterfall looking down into the cave.
Unfortunately, the only way the rope wanted to go was right down the waterfall. After a quick, wet canyoneering type descent, the rope and I dried off quickly in the mid-eighties breezy air.
Well that was a first for me. And, to make it even better, Karla, who is documenting the route setting in the Valley, credited me with an "FD" -- first descent.
We are keeping our fingers crossed that Jared will find this cave dihedral to be a climbable route.
Rick
A tale: While scouting for new routes, Jared Hancock and Karla Caradang recently discovered a cave in the Valley with bear prints and skat nearby. (We understand they do range through the area, but don't stick around.) Like most RRG caves, this one is not long --only about 35 feet deep -- but is unusual inasmuch as it has a very tall ceiling -- about 75 feet high. The entrance is only about 10 feet high by 6 feet wide. Inside the cave is a trickling waterfall, and about 15 feet away is a beautiful dry maybe-climbable dihedral (sport.)
Jared has marked this dihedral as a project and will be bolting it soon. A 70 foot climb inside a cave!!
The most curious feature can be seen when you lean into the dihedral wall. Near the top of the 75 foot ceiling is a faint glow of light, coming in from god knows where above.
With Jared's blessing, I grabbed a rope and some gear and headed up to the top to see if I could find the opening where the light was coming in. After an hour of scrambling and bushwhacking through the Great Eastern Kentucky Rhododendron Jungle, I found a tiny dark hole and yelled through it. Sure, enough they could hear me in the cave. The hole was barely big enough to wiggle through. But, not knowing if it squeezed down more, I continued to look for another opening. After rapping down a big dihedral about 12 feet to a ledge, I found another opening, not much bigger but looking a little less gloomy.
Although, they could hear me yell through the opening, everything I threw down, didn't drop to the cave floor -- including the rope. We guessed that the 60 meter rope was long enough and was just getting hung up in the upper caverns.
So, I anchored the rope and lowered down into the hole with only one prusik rope if I had to retreat up. I've never liked the idea of caving, but this was too cool to pass up. The cavern snaked down through the rock and opened up instead of closing down. In a few minutes I was hanging above the waterfall looking down into the cave.
Unfortunately, the only way the rope wanted to go was right down the waterfall. After a quick, wet canyoneering type descent, the rope and I dried off quickly in the mid-eighties breezy air.
Well that was a first for me. And, to make it even better, Karla, who is documenting the route setting in the Valley, credited me with an "FD" -- first descent.
We are keeping our fingers crossed that Jared will find this cave dihedral to be a climbable route.
Rick
