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Jamaican Caving Notes |
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June 12, 2004 DEESIDE ROARING RIVER CAVE Field notes: R. S. STEWART Cavers: R. S. Stewart, I. C. Conolley, M. Bellinger, M. Peterson, C. Timmons, R. Stirling Time in: 13:00 EST, Time out: 17:00 EST THREAT VULNERABILITY: Medium This day, a Saturday, found us at Deeside Cave with our usual large weekend crew. Mark and Ivor had arrived from Kingston the night before with two new Peace Corps volunteers and we'd decided to stay fairly close to home by visiting Deeside and Duppy. Deeside would also serve as a bit of a training run for the verticals of the following day, when we would be at Volcano Hole. Although the drop distance wasn't comparable, it would at least get everyone on a rope again. Several hours had been spent in the morning at the Last Resort giving a lesson to our two new volunteers, so we didn't actually arrive at the first target, Deeside, until past noon. This wasn't a concern, because the entrance is quite close to the road and we had rigged the drop several times before. Fifteen minutes after we'd parked, we were in the cave, through the first squeeze, and were tying the rope to the usual large boulder above the drop. Unfortunately, because it was Saturday noon, and the road-side resurgence from the cave had a number of people bathing and doing laundry, we managed to pick-up several "guests" on our way to the entrance. As things turned out, this wasn't a problem, but it of course neccesitated having one of the crew stay at the top of the drop to ensure that our rope stayed in the cave. Ivor and Rona volunteered for this; Mark, Melissa, Cory, and I, would head down. Mark Bellinger is our Peace Corps liaison, and is superb at vertical work, so he'd been put in charge of safe-guarding our two PC guests both up and down. Melissa was an accomplished climber, and fine with descent, but was very rusty on ascent. Cory, as far as I can remember, had no experience other than her lesson on a line hung from the porch at Ivor's that morning. I rapped down first, demonstrating and giving them a few tips, and then Mark checked harnesess and descenders at the top, and coached, while Melissa and Cory came down. As expected, they had no problems. All four of us were soon at the bottom. I was the guide on this trek, being the only one of the four who had been here before, so I led the way through the little low stal curtain at the west end of the drop-chamber, into the talus chamber, then up through the narrow gap high on the north, and into the Canyon. Our new volunteers were very careful, as I'd asked, to not use delicate formations as handholds, or kick off others while using them for footholds. The four of us moved steadily forward, causing the least disturbance possible to the cave. Before too long, we were at the far end of the Canyon chambers and had reached the small corkscrew that would take us into the River Pit. The River Pit is a fascinating thing; during dry times, the river is low, flowing through, and only partially filling, a passage that the pit drops into. One hears the roar of the water that crashes through the passage from well back in the Canyon. During the rainy-season, like now, the current into the pit is so great that the road-side resurgence cannot handle it all, and as a result it backs up into the River Pit, the Pit acting like a giant stand-pipe, and one hears no sound of water crashing in the submerged passage that the Pit drops into. Thusly, when it is dry-times, the river is loud; when it is wet-times, the river is quiet. Now, June, with the waters high, the noise of the flooded River Pit was reduced to a little trickle from the depths. Even though I'd been in this cave several times before, I had yet to to reach the furthest known section, past the Pit. Accomplishing this was a high priority for me today. I suspected that there might be more very tight squeezes ahead, so I suggested to Melissa and Cory that they stay on the ledge above the Pit while Mark and I explored further. This was fine with them, since they were quite comfortable and were having a little snack. Anticipating crawls ahead, I left my pack with the ladies on the ledge, and Mark and I began to work our way around the side of the Pit to reach the section beyond. The route beyond the ledge goes over boulders on the left side of the Pit. Towards the far side, one sees two ways on: through a low gap, between close-set stals, just above the floor, or over a boulder on the right hand-side. One must take the scramble over the boulder, despite the drop into the Pit close on the right. Do it carefully, lest you fall. Now, to the SW, new chambers begin. A series of medium-sized chambers, well-decorated with stals, lies to the west of the river Pit. A journey through these, over breakdown boulders, takes one into a final medium-sized chamber where Eleuth's, (frogs), present in good numbers, chirp from their rocky perches; where many snail shells are found rafted from the surface; and great tree roots stretch across the floor. There is no doubt: at this point the outside world is not far away. Eleutherodactylus cundalli are troglophiles; they are always close inside an entrance. The snails that left the shells were not cave-dwellers; none are. The tree roots had not penetrated metres of rock to reach this chamber. In search of the route to the outside, Mark and I started by turning off our headlamps and looking for daylight; no luck. Next, we explored the smaller neighbouring chambers, with nothing do-able found. After about 20 min's of looking, we were left with a best-guess. The route to the surface is at the far end of the final chamber, through a very low crawl, where the snail shells and roots are the greatest. After several metres, the height is under 30 cm, and it offered no passage to humans this day. But, with a little work, it will on another day. Accordingly, I am posting an advisory that will be found at the end of these notes. Having found all that we could, (since we didn't have a shovel), the two of us worked our way back to Melissa and Cory. As we approached the River Pit, and the scramble back onto the ledge, we could hear Melissa and Cory chatting and could see occasional glimpses of light from their headlamps on the ceiling of the chamber. Somehow, it made everything seem very homey, comfortable, like hearing girls passing the time of day on a porch ahead of us. This was the first time we'd ever had more than one woman at a time with us in a serious cave. It was very pleasant. Once reunited on the ledge, the four of us began our way back to the drop-chamber. Knowing that Melissa had caving experience with Adam Hyde, and thusly knew what she was doing, I thought this would be a good time to give her an opportunity to lead a team. Once we had made our way through the corkscrew into the Canyon section, I asked her to take over. Melissa, in good form, took us right to the final stal squeeze into the drop-chamber, no problem. Several minures later, we were back at the base of the rope. For the ascent, we again kept to our plan to have Mark as supervisor, and trainer, for the other PC volunteers. I headed up first, giving a few tips, then Mark checked gear and coached as Melissa and Cory prusiked up the line. They both had no problems, and we were soon pulling rope and preparing to leave the cave. It was now about 17:00 and we had no time for Duppy Cave, but it had been a productive day all the same. Several notes: The GPS position was checked again. +/- 5 m is what you'll get with GPS WAAS, 5+ sat's, without standing there and averaging. The map in JU is not truly representative of what is found beyond the River Pit. On our way into the cave, as we had passed the first squeeze after the entrance, there had been a strong smell of wood-smoke in the air. This was still present 12 m down in the drop-chamber, and indeed on into the Canyon. It was still detectable in the River Pit, past another tight squeeze. After our ascent, when we found a half-dozen guest/audience at the top of the drop, I asked about the smoke. I was told that they had been cooking in the entrance chamber the day before. This is interesting in two ways: it shows that there was at least a slight inward flow of air to the cave from the road-side entrance; it shows the length of time that a cave can be disturbed by an activity that takes place at the very outermost part of the cave. The smoke was strong in the bat-roosts of the drop-chamber and the bat numbers seemed very low. Judging by the strength of the smoke after 24 hours, it would be an irritant to the bats for at least 48. If the cook-out in the cave entrance is taking place once a week, then the bat-roosts are being disturbed two out of every seven days. The cook-outs might not be so regular, and the smoke may linger more than 48 hours, but despite the vagueness of the parameter, it remains a potentially serious irritant to the bats. The presence of that amount of smoke also indicates a very low rate of airflow. The water in the River Pit was high, choking any chance of flow inward from the resurgence, but a slight convective flow was still managing to waft through most of the cave. When water levels are low in the River Pit, the flow is much stronger. I have to think that the flow we noted was being driven by the fissures close to the surface, higher on the hill, that are at the far end of the cave. JCO ADVISORY: Stefan Stewart hereby gives notice that the completion of Deeside is currently my territory and I would like others to stay out of it until myself and my crew have had a chance to get back, expected to be Aug-Sep 2004. Thank you for your cooperation. |
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