 |
Jamaican Caving Notes |
 |
|
|
Mar 04, 2003 ROTTEN GOAT CRAWL: Field notes: R. S. STEWART Cavers: R. S. Stewart, I. C. Conolley, M. Taylor The second cave of March 4, after our visit to Grasslice Cave with Victor, was reached by a long hike through pasture land to the north of the Deeside/Maroon Town Rd. Although in reality the distance covered was only about 3 km each way, the early afternoon sun and heat made it seem much further. A brief stop had been made at the Lada to get more Pyro to combat the plentiful ticks, and this was mostly effective. The final trek to the cave, as yet unseen by us but known to Victor, was uphill for a kilometre, and took us into a saddle to the east of a large hill in which the entrance apparently was set. It didn't look terribly encouraging, the entrance being quite high for a cave that might be of any great extent, but of course we had to have a look. At the top of the saddle, we headed up to the west then contoured around to the south. Just before we came to the entrance, several metres before, there was a very ripe, dead, rotting goat that had been recently deposited by Victor. The stench, in the heat of the day, was powerful. After stepping quickly around the rotten goat, we were greeted by an insignificant looking crawl into the hill. The opening was about 1 m wide and twice that high. A quick exploration showed this cave to consist of one crawl of about 10 m ending in a choked upward vertical, apparently the source of the water that had carved the passage. We crawled back out and stayed only long enough to get a GPS position, then hiked off to return to the Lada. This little cave is receiving a name by virtue of the work, and stench, involved in getting to it, and more importantly, to warn off anyone else from wasting their time if told of this opening by Victor. The GPS position has been entered in the Register. At the Lada, while changing and getting ready to head down the road, an interesting, oldish, neighbour of Victor's came along. In the course of things we learned of a very deep sinkhole nearby. Victor apparently new of it but considered it so dangerous that he didn't want to tell us about it! He hasn't seen us in action so has no idea of what we're capable. We've learned of it now anyway and it's set for the next caving session, in April, but it's a shame we wasted time on Rotten Goat when we could have been exploring something challengeing. Next time. Victor says he knows of still several more entrances closeby but we'll need to question him carefully before we hike kilometres in hope of something good. |
 |
| Jamaican Cave Notes - Main Page | March 2003 Caving Notes - Main Page |