CRF Lava Beds National Monument Thanksgiving 1997 Trip Report I had been looking forward to the Thanksgiving CRF Lava Beds trip since missing the last one, several months previous, due to work. Shortly after joining the grotto, I discovered that project caving was, for me, very rewarding, and I hoped to pick up some survey experience so I could be more useful on future trips. As it turns out, I would not be disappointed. The trip up was relatively uneventful. Ken and Lysa rented a van, and jammed themselves, plus four high school kids from Santa Cruz and some poor guy, Jonah, into the equipment-laden vehicle. (Didn't expect to go caving so soon, did you Jonah? Welcome to the grotto!) I made number eight, which was one more then the van had seats for. To avoid sitting on the floor, I volunteered to drive most of the trip up, and all 441.8 miles of it back. We must have been quite a sight driving down the freeway, with hundreds of pounds of camping and caving equipment tied to the poor, sagging roof. Arriving at the park sometime after dark, we were greeted by the early-birds with a wonderful Thanksgiving meal. After a brief CRF overview and orientation, I wandered over to my assigned apartment and rapidly fell asleep. That drive sure takes a lot out of you! Day 1: Cave Surveying, Bats, and Sore Ankles The survey begins by finding a "brass pin," just outside the cave entrance, which acts as the first survey station. Invariably, the pins tend to be located in the absolute worst position for a station. This one, for example, was not in line of sight of the entrance to allow a straight shot in, and was barely in a position where a second station could easily be created. Oh well, we did the best we could and eventually found ourselves inside the cave. It was here I learned the wisdom of choosing the next survey station based not only on its line of sight to the previous station, but also in line of sight of the next potential station. You also want to make sure you won't have to stand on your head to get your readings. The first cave is broken into three distinct sections. The main entrance is a large room with a six foot ceiling. The floor is covered with the worst breakdown imaginable: shattered blocks of basalt of all shapes and sizes, precariously balanced in such a way as to make walking quite tedious. It took approximately ten, maybe twenty, minutes before I twisted my ankle for the first time. It was a good one too! My right foot slipped between two blocks, and my left foot acted as a lever against another, smashing my poor ankle nicely. I was determined to play it cool, and only yelped slightly. The second tube segment was a bit larger, with ceilings reaching at least twenty feet. Unfortunately, the floors were still covered in the nasty breakdown. It was here I learned yet another survey lesson, this one particular to basalt: the magnetic anomaly. Apparently, basalt can be magnetic under certain circumstances. This phenomena tends to occur exactly where you picked your next survey station. The station is most likely to be anomalous if it is the best station, positionally speaking, in the area. For example, if the next best station requires you to dislocate your neck to get a good shot, you're guaranteed to get an anomaly at the better station. I also twisted my ankle the second time here. Same ankle of course, which was beginning to get rather sore. It was for this reason that, when presented with the opportunity to push a crawlway leaving the main tube, I decided to get off my ankle for a little while and get on my stomach. The passage was about three feet wide, but only sixteen inches to two feet high. Here another lesson was learned about lava tubes. If the floor isn't covered with nasty breakdown, it is covered with even nastier Aa lava. Aa lava is formed when a fast moving lava flow cools rapidly while it is still flowing, causing the surface to bunch up into a rough, spiked floor which is about as pleasant to crawl on as a bed of sharpened railroad spikes. It bites into your knees, chews at your shins, rips into your elbows, and grips at your clothing with a depressing tenacity. Movement tends to be as graceful as if you were covered with industrial strength Velcro from hell. In limestone, this crawl would have been a snap, but with Aa underneath, and a relatively low ceiling full of shark-tooth stalactites, I was beginning to wonder if it would be better to attempt a marathon run on my rapidly swelling ankle. Another lesson was about to be learned: shark-tooth stalactites jammed into your back suck. For those unfamiliar with this type of speleothm, shark-tooth stalactites are usually formed when the lava flow becomes so hot that it begins to remelt the ceiling of the tube, causing the molten rock to begin dripping off the ceiling. Let's just say these things are aptly named, and you'll never forget them if you fail to keep the top of your back lower then the top of your head. Unfortunately, this isn't particularly easy, especially with Aa lava underneath. The tube bit me. Once, but it was enough. After that, I almost felt like I was in boot camp during a live fire drill, crawling under barbed wire with live rounds being fired inches overhead. Anyway, it was about sixty or seventy feet of miserable crawling, and I was beginning to have mixed feelings about the entire affair. Going passage is going passage and I was very excited to have the opportunity to be pushing it. On the other hand, every foot I go in is another foot I'm going to have to go out. Just as I strengthened my resolve to go on, the tube ended in a very small domed room. A bat, maybe a myotis, hung upside down directly in the middle of the three foot high dome. It stared at me, looking rather perturbed. Its nose twitched as it followed my movements with its eyes and ears, in unison. Slowly it opened and closed its tiny mouth, as if to complain about my intrusion but censoring itself to maintain a sense of dignity. It shifted its position slightly, wrapping leathery wings tightly around a tiny, light tan body. That was my cue. I respectfully backed out, which seemed to satisfy the sleepy myotis, as it closed its eyes and became still. On the way out, I decided to turn over and glance back at the low ceiling periodically, to see if any other bats were housed in this tube. About halfway out, I turned over and nearly kissed what looked like a plecotus. About three inches from my face, the little bat was fast asleep, wrapped in a tight furry ball. I held my breath, afraid to awaken him with my warm breath, and managed to slither away without disturbing him. Obviously, this passage will have to be surveyed later, when the bats have awoken from their slumber and food is plentiful. No survey is worth killing two bats over, and I suddenly felt a surge of guilt over invading their bedroom. The bats weren't unique to that little passage. At least ten other hibernating bats were spotted in the second and third segments of the cave, and yet another flying about frantically. We finished the survey of the rest of the tube as quickly as possible, but left one side passage for the following day, back in the bat-free first segment, since it was getting late and we were all rather tired. Late Night Cleanups The second cave was Valentine, very much different from Indian. Gentle, round walking passage snaked around, wrapping in on itself and breaking off into smaller, round tubes which met back up with the main tube. The floor was of pleasant pahohoe lava, a smoother, stringy surface formed when the lava flow slowed before freezing. In spots, short lava falls were formed, and I could almost picture the tubes alive with molten rock, then suddenly frozen in time. This cave was warm and comfortable, and we all joked that this would be a beautiful place to throw down some sleeping bags and spend the night. I even forgot about my sore ankle, until I managed to somehow twist it again. At about this point, I must have been walking like a penguin, but the smile on my face hide my pain from the others. This place is magical, and I wanted to explore every inch of it. There was very little trash in Valentine, but what was there was the worst kind possible: broken glass. Pahohoe lava is relatively smooth, but it also forms long grooves which are perfect for swallowing shards of glass and keeping them just out of reach. Very frustrating. I would much prefer the beer-guzzling idiots would simply leave the bottles upright in the middle of the passage, to make retrieval easier, but obviously we're dealing with a special kind of idiot here. We did the best we could. The final cave of the night was Skull Cave. If I thought Indian was massive, Skull was almost capable of invoking a feeling of agoraphobia. The ceiling was nearly 120 feet high, and the hand-railed passage ran along one wall about twenty feet above the breakdown covered floor. The back of Skull contained two tubes within the main tube. One tube ran downward, and into a cold, ice-covered floor. Since there was about an inch of water over the ice, I decided not to risk getting my feet wet and backed out, but the others went on and returned to tell of a beautiful chamber with the walls and ceiling covered by a clear, foot thick sheet of ice. The second tube ran in the same direction as the first, but this time above. Ken decided to explore this area, but my ankle was really beginning to throb at this point so I decided to stay put. If I had joined Ken, I would have discovered another small chamber, this one with a floor of ice. It turns out, this was probably the same chamber at the end of the lower tube, and Ken was most likely walking on top of the other cavers! On the way out of Skull Cave, Lysa and the gang walked the length of the main tube along the real floor, searching for discarded trash thrown off the path and into the breakdown below. They found a few cans, some more glass, and a flashcube that must have been there since the seventies. Day 2: Scary Passage, Discovery, and the Second Cave The last passage to survey was a small belly crawl off the first segment. The floor was soft, but unfortunately this was due to its "use" by packrats. I won't go into details. My ankle was still sore, and there wasn't much room down there so I sat outside the tube, just looking at the surrounding rock. They soon finished, but there was still a question mark on the map. The passage ended up becoming very tight, and though it kept going, noone really wanted to push it much further. Since it was heading straight towards Sentinel Trench, Jonah and I decided to stay behind and do a surface survey to see how close it really got and if we could find the source of a good airflow which taunted the team underground. The rest of the group would go on to the next cave. From what Jonah and I could tell, the surface survey had the last station ending about seventy feet from the trench. Since we couldn't find an obvious crack or entrance, plus the fact that it was beginning to rain, we felt it would be best to go back under and see how much further we could push. Underground, the passage quickly turned from tube into breakdown. It was more of a space under boulders then an actual lava tube, and every time we bumped into anything, we imagined it was the one rock which just happened to hold everything together. It quickly became apparent why they didn't push on. The passage obviously went, but pinched down to about seven inches in a spot, with a thin, blade-like rock sticking up like a spearhead right in the way. Neither of us were willing to end up run through the neck just to push a few extra feet of not-very-promising passage. No need to erase a perfectly good question mark... On the way to the next cave, we were met by Lysa who went to find out what was taking us so long. We chatted for a few minutes, and she mentioned a small entrance she spotted earlier. I instantly knew what she was talking about. Apparently I passed the same entrance earlier, but thought nothing of it. After all, surely someone would have spotted it previously. But noone in the group knew a thing about it, so Lysa and I decided to take a look real quick before going on the next cave. This very well might be a new cave! This new entrance was a six foot high, moss covered triangle. The first chamber was like nothing I had seen so far. The walls were light grey, much lighter then other tubes, and the floor was covered with a white powder, probably calcite. Two borehole passages yelled "going passage!" but the first one Lysa checked went only twenty feet or so, before choking off. Mine went twenty feet as well, but at the end was a small squeeze, maybe ten inches, which opened into a small room high enough to stand in. I let Lysa push it, and I quickly followed. This room was completely the opposite of the other, with pure black walls and an almost scorched appearance. Lysa and I were pretty pleased with ourselves, and sat there for awhile thinking up names for our new cave, when it suddenly dawned on us that we had both sets of survey equipment! We made a hasty retreat and met up with the rest of the group at the other cave, apologizing profusely for our tardy arrival. The survey went somewhat smoother, even though we lost half the team at some point. Jonah took on the job of sketcher, his first shot at the job, and I think he did wonderfully. Again, this cave is a breakdown filled, ankle twisting tube. The first section is about 100 feet long. It then forks off to the right, goes under a skylight, and a second tube, somewhat smaller, doubles back on the main tube. About halfway through it pinched down to a four inch "crawl." Due to the lack of any cavers capable of squeezing into a four inch high area, the survey ended there. The cave also hooks to the left, through another large passage, again about 100 feet long. The first half of the passage has a series of four or five large, car sized blocks neatly lined up against one wall. The other side of the passage contained a block of breakdown roughly the size of a big rig truck. Impressive. We were getting rather tired at this point, and with one more station to shoot out past the dripline, we were all rather disappointed to find another small passage which may have been just barely large enough to require another station. This prompted an argument about what constituted a "passage" and what was merely a "space between boulders." Playing devil's advocate, I insisted it was passage and needed to be surveyed. Truth be told, I didn't want to survey the rotten thing either. Just before fists started to fly, Jonah suggested he could simply shoot a single ray down the passage without setting up a new station. None of us argued, and we quickly finished the survey. The "New" Cave Getting back to the entrance chamber, it became obvious how we missed the passage. Since we were in a hurry, we didn't notice the low twelve inch crawl which lead to this new passage. About twenty feet of crawling on some nasty Aa, the passage dropped down three feet into picture perfect walking passage, about six feet high and going. About fifty feet down, the passage got a bit wider and we ran into a flat round piece of breakdown directly in the middle of the chamber. Carefully crafted with rocks was the year "1995," around the table's edges, and in the center were two flashlights and a wristwatch. There was also a pen (blue, Bic) and a yellow pad of paper. The packrats made lunch of the pad, but we were able to make out one name: Robert. Obviously, that Robert was as impressed with the cave as this Robert was! The passage kept going, and going, and going. Here and there it would branch off. One small chamber had walls covered with lava helictites, and a single lava stalagmite which looked exactly like a black corn-on-the-cob. Slime molds sparkled everywhere, like gold glitter shimmering in our lights. Down one passage, the floor began the resonate. There was actually another tube underneath this one! One chamber had a tube cutting through it at an angle, too high to reach but almost definitely going. Every passage was different, and had its own unique charm. There was even a small pile of bones around the back of the cave. This was was a beautiful, and everything you would ever want in a lava tube. With at least 2500 feet of passage, all Lysa and I could say, over and over, was "I wish we discovered this!" I can't wait to see what we "discover" at Lava Beds next time!
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