Re: [Texascavers] Green place in Mexico
This message is probably from one of them. There is no personal identifier in the message. Evatt -Original Message- From: via Texascavers Sent: Saturday, January 14, 2017 8:54 PM To: texascavers@texascavers.com Subject: Re: [Texascavers] Green place in Mexico Watch out. The Gulf Cartel is still considered a big threat in Tamaulipas. Mixon Bill via Texascavers wrote: > From Association for Mexican Cave Studies Newsletter vol 4, pp. 55-56 report > on trip by a number of French cavers led by Bill Russell (OCR of scan will > have errors): > Le 10 au soir, nous etablissons Ie campement > pres du Rio de Jaumave dans la Sierra de Tamaulipas. Le 11 est notre premiere > journee d'exploration > au Mexique. Du Rancho Picacho aenviron 30 km de Ciudad Victoria, un berger > nous > guide dans la canon de Fraile. Deux petites grottes sont explorees et > topographiees: la Cueva > de Fraile et la Cueva del Canon de Fraile. Dans la soir~e, reconnaissance des > S6tanos de Altes > Cumbres pres de la highway a 25 km de Ciudad Victoria. Le lendemain, un > groupe continue > l'exploration et la topographie des S6tanos de Altes Cumbres nO 1 et nO 2. Un > autre groupe > reconnait dans la Sierra, a une heure de marche du Rancho Picacho des > gouffres sans importance. > Dans la soiree, une pointe rapide est effectuee a Hoya Verde, a 9 km de la > highway. There is a map of a cave at http://www.mexicancaves.org/maps/0327.pdf. I found that text by looking at the index to the volume on the AMCS web site at mexicancaves.org. Get familiar with the resources there. -- Mixon Nature is a hanging judge. You may "reply" to the address this message (unless it's a TexasCavers list post) came from, but for long-term use, save: Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu AMCS: a...@mexicancaves.org or sa...@mexicancaves.org ___ Texascavers mailing list | http://texascavers.com Texascavers@texascavers.com | Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/texascavers@texascavers.com/ http://lists.texascavers.com/listinfo/texascavers ___ Texascavers mailing list | http://texascavers.com Texascavers@texascavers.com | Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/texascavers@texascavers.com/ http://lists.texascavers.com/listinfo/texascavers___ Texascavers mailing list | http://texascavers.com Texascavers@texascavers.com | Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/texascavers@texascavers.com/ http://lists.texascavers.com/listinfo/texascavers
Re: [Texascavers] 1966 NSS Convention Photos
I was happy to see the photos of the ’66 NSS Convention in Sequoia National Park appear on the Texas Caver List. It brought back many great memories of the park and Giant Forest in particular. I, like Bill Mixon, did not make that convention although I had been an NSS member for two years. I would have loved to be there. And I was, before and after. In March of 1966 I went to work as a traveling auditor for the Fred Harvey Company (“The civilizer of the West”, “3,000 Miles of Hospitality”). Having earned no vacation time in the period between March and June that year, I could not take any time off to vacation anywhere, much less the Convention. But I made up for it. In 1965, negotiations commenced between George Mauger, President and General Manager of Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks Company, and the Harvey family in their corporate offices in Chicago. Mauger wanted to sell his park concession franchise for Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks, and Fred Harvey was a logical choice for buyer as they were the primary concessionaire (for nearly fifty years!) in Grand Canyon National Park. The deal was consummated in the spring of 1966 and Fred Harvey took over the inns, restaurants, gas stations, markets, gift shops, public transportation system, freight hauling, and other stuff in the two parks. In May 1966 the western division of the field audit function of Fred Harvey, based in the Alvarado Hotel in Albuquerque, got the call from Chicago. Get out to Sequoia and perform asset verifications for everything that Harvey had just acquired. It was sort of an after-the-fact due diligence. All three of us on the team packed and headed west. We were there for about three weeks, and found all was in order. That was surprising for a quick take-over then - and highly improbable nowadays. While I was there those weeks, I fell in love with Sequoia National Park. I thought, if they ever disband the Fred Harvey auditing teams, here I would most like to work. The management cabins in Giant Forest there were relatively new but small – only two 10 x 12 rooms plus a bathroom. But, wow! – what a fantastic backyard! I remember on the third night there (Spring 1966) being invited to an employee party at the employee dorm in Giant Forest Village. We auditors were housed in guest cabins at Giant Forest Lodge about a half-mile up the road. The village area and the Inn area were sufficiently lit at night to see one’s way among the paths and buildings, but going between the two locations was like caving sans light. No starlight (tree cover blocked it), no moon, nothing. I walked and weaved down the middle of the General’s Highway with no flashlight at midnight. As the few cars out late that night appeared from either direction (at least three or four minutes between them average), I retreated to the side of the road and did what I could to memorize the layout of the road ahead from their headlights. When each passed, it was back to effective absolute darkness. I was only able to follow the center stripes on the road by walking down one to its end, walking three or four more paces, and finally catching a glimpse of the beginning of the next one. Man was it ever dark! I did make it back to my cabin, taking over ¾ hour to walk about ½ mile on pavement. Truly caving above ground. I traveled with the auditing team for 5 years. Each year in spring and again in fall we spent 3-week auditing stints in Sequoia and Kings Canyon. When Amfac took over Fred Harvey in 1968, things got really bad for Harvey employees. The auditing function was outsourced in 1971, and I took a Controller position at The Ranch House Inn and golf courses in Valencia/Newhall, CA just north of LA. After a year there, the working conditions became intolerable and I hit the road. Literally. Another Harvey employee and I got in my Jeep CJ-5 and drove to Fairbanks on a glorious forget-the-bastards summer vacation that lasted for seven weeks. Then I had to go back to work to avoid starving. I called the new General Manager at Sequoia in August and asked if he needed a Controller. He was one of Fred Harvey’s Good Guys, having just earned his 40-year company pin the year before (1971). He said “Not just yet” but took my phone number. “You’ll hear from me.” I got the call a month later. “How soon can you be here?” he asked. “Is yesterday soon enough?” I worked in Giant Forest, Sequoia National Park, from September 1972 through May 1976. Hiked my ass off on the few days off I got. When the snow wasn’t five thick. The Good Guy retired, and his replacement GM was effectively still in diapers. (Not the Depends type either.) I left and came back in February 1980 when they appointed another new GM who was my best friend in Harvey during the auditing years. He was forced out of the GM position by the Lobotomized Trolls who were now running the Fred Harvey subsidiary of Amfac barely a year later. And
Re: [Texascavers] I'm back
Wouldn't be a Convention without ya. Glad you are out of the hoosegow. E ^v^ -Original Message- From: Mixon Bill via Texascavers Sent: Thursday, June 30, 2016 3:32 PM To: Cavers Texas Subject: [Texascavers] I'm back Back at home, pneumonia infection cured, but still weak. I'll deal with accumulated e-mails as time permits. -- Mixon What great comfort is there to be derived from a wife well obeyed!—Anthony Trollope, Barchester Towers You may "reply" to the address this message (unless it's a TexasCavers list post) came from, but for long-term use, save: Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu AMCS: a...@mexicancaves.org or sa...@mexicancaves.org ___ Texascavers mailing list | http://texascavers.com Texascavers@texascavers.com | Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/texascavers@texascavers.com/ http://lists.texascavers.com/listinfo/texascavers ___ Texascavers mailing list | http://texascavers.com Texascavers@texascavers.com | Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/texascavers@texascavers.com/ http://lists.texascavers.com/listinfo/texascavers
Re: [Texascavers] Couple eaten by sinkhole in Korea
When the Devil wants you, he'll go to any lengths to get you.
Back in the '60's, I was on the team that first dropped the skylight to Big
Door Cave in the Guads. (Tom Meador was first, me second.) The skylight was
on a sloping ledge, cliffs above and below. After we'd dropped and were
headed toward the main entrance (where we exited), we noticed a room on the
right that had a very high ceiling. We all thought that the top seemed very
near the surface, probably along the same ledge.
Years later ('80's) it was reported that someone was walking on that ledge
between the two entrances when the ground gave way. The lucky fellow fell on
his crotch, one leg going in the new hole and the other sliding toward the
edge of the cliff. Albeit sore, he lived to walk back to his vehicle on the
main ridge.
Sure enough about two years later I was back to Big Door and went into that
same mid-room. Saw daylight up there that time, supporting the veracity of
the story.
Big Door Cave is also known as Hermit, Wild Man, Owl, and at least two other
names.
Owls yea, no bats. No WNS.
Watch where you walk! Better to fall 10 feet from the sidewalk than 140 feet
into Big Door Cave.
Jim Evatt
Subject: [Texascavers] Couple eaten by sinkhole in Korea
Interesting video of some folks getting off a bus and having the earth give
way and falling into a pit. I understand they only went about 10 feet but
I'm sure it was an exciting ride.
Subject: couple eaten by sinkhole in Korea
http://news.yahoo.com/sinkhole-swallows-korean-couple-150426100.html
Geary Schindel
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