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Jamaican Caving Notes |
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June 8, 2004 BELLY-FULL CAVE Position: WGS84 - 18 22' 46.8" N, 77 51' 59.3" W, +/- 5 m Field notes: R. S. STEWART Cavers: R. S. Stewart, M. Taylor, D. K. Roggy Time in: 13:00 EST, Time out: 17:00 EST THREAT VULNERABILITY: Low June 8 was my third day of caving this session, and the first that would be spent on my own work, the St James Assessment Project. My plan was to first visit Roehampton, in further search of the phantom Lawson Bottom Cave, and then move onto Belly-Full. We had a new contact in Roehampton, suggested by Joan Blake: Peta Peterkin, a cousin and long-time resident of Roehampton. After picking up D in MoBay, we journeyed up the Anchovy road, making our usual stop en route for pastries and batteries, and arrived at the Roehampton crossroads shortly before noon. Not long afterwards, we linked with Peta. Although Peta was of great help, and showed us a couple of possibilities, nothing panned out. Additional discussions with the crossroads crew, whom we know well now, only supplied reports of other caves that we'd visited. We decided to try one last time by getting a GPS position in front of the school, then use the bearing and distance as listed in JU for Lawson Bottom, (about 300 SE of Roehampton School), to find the corresponding position using the GPS. This brought us to a place that we had looked at before, using compass and guess-work for distance, but this time, Martel and Dietrich began to comb the hillside while I spoke with two men, in succession, who had appeared from a near-by yard wondering what we were about. The first man I spoke to informed me that he was not from the district but that his friend who lived here might be able to help. The friend then approached from his previous watchful position, with a very serious expression on his face. There was a look about him that suggested that he might smoke something other than herb. I began my inquiries, "We're working on a research project and looking for a specific cave that is listed very close to here. Would you know anything about it? etc etc". It was quickly made very clear that, yes he knew of it and that we shouldn't go to it for various reasons all involving danger, (scorpions, ratbats, snakes). As he told me this, his look became more disturbed than serious and I quickly realized that there was some reason other than our personal welfare that suggested we not make our visit. I assured him that our interest was only scientific, that we would see nothing but bugs and bats, and that anything else was none of our business and would be treated that way. He seemed to realize that I was intent on finding the cave, no matter what, and accordingly told us to return tomorrow because it was not possible today. Good enough. I figured he could work out a detour to avoid whatever we shouldn't see, or move whatever we shouldn't find, in the interim. We arranged for 11:00 AM the following day, climbed into the car, (Martel and D having returned while I was in discussions, after not finding anything), and we headed for Welcome Hall to reach Belly-Full Cave. On Jan 29, 2004, we had discovered a new cave near Welcome Hall in a district called "Belly-full", but had found it late in the day without enough time to explore more than the first 50 m. The following expedition, Mar-Apr, we didn't have time to get back to it, but this session, I made sure we made time. One concern was that we were now in the rainy-season and this new cave was a stream-passage that took water. Nevertheless, we would have a go at it. We found the entrance again quickly, having our Jan GPS position to use, and were soon entering the cave. There was the usual June soundtrack of thunderstorms rumbling over the surrounding hills, as we went in, but because there was no actual rain yet, we decided to see how far we could get without loitering for too long inside. An entrance of about 4 m width and 2 high, facing SE, is found against the side of a small hill. Through well-bedded hard limestone, probably Cretaceous, a stream passage extends at a bearing of about 325 true. The passage basically maintains a width of about 3 m and heigt of 1.5 for the first 20 m and then begins to cut lower into the limestone in a section with breakdown boulders. A side-passage was noted just past the boulders, but not explored. From this point on, we began to enter pools and the passage height became lower. After about 30 m, the increased sound of thunder reaching us through the rock, and the presence of recently rafted organic debris near the ceiling, noted right from the start of the cave, along with fresh deposits of silt, suggested that we call a halt to things. It appeared as though the cave had flooded during the surface-trough rains of two weeks before, and it could easily and quickly flood again. We turned around and headed back out. While moving through a narrow gap, to pass the breakdown boulders, with my pack held ahead in my hand, I stepped down onto an edge which broke off and sent me for a fall of about a metre onto a boulder below. This was my second fall in as many days and I was not pleased with myself. I was still operating on not enough sleep with a corresponding decrease in concentration. I vowed to myself that I would get at least 8 hours this night so that I could get in gear before I did serious injury. Despite this fall, the three of us were soon out into a hard down-pour, complete with lightning, and made our notes in the shelter of the car. Biologically, we saw no bats or inverts, other than Sesarma, (crabs), due to a seasonal flooding of the cave. Morphologically, the cave is classic St James stream-passage in well-bedded limestone and has potential. The GPS position from Jan repeated to about 5 m, (I wasn't sure of where exactly I stood before, but it certainly enables the entrance to be seen). We will return during the dry-season to finish the exploration and do a map. |
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