[Texascavers] Las Grutas de Carrizal
I strongly believe that the most constructive potential project for Mexican and US cavers to work together on a long term project is at Las Grutas de Carrizal. Has anyone recently tried to push the leads ? How accurate and complete is the map ? What other caves are within hiking distance ? A hot-tub could easily setup, although the water at the entrance is mostly just watered-down bat excrement. Imagine getting the water from the upsteam sump to fill the hot-tub. Camping is secluded and there is shade. I am certain that the Monarch Butterflies refuge there at the spring. My personal opinion is there are too many bats in the cave, and they should go find another nearby cave where they won't contaminate the water source. Imagine the cave cleared of all that dusty guano ? There could be some picturesque photos to take. Imagine a good gate on the cave. Imagine a caver hut outside like at Punkin and Deep. David Locklear ___ 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] Las Grutas de Carrizal
For those who don't know Carrizal, it is an unusual cave with two streams that converge near its spring entrance. One stream is cool and the other warm. Around 1980 I dove the sumps at the end of both streams. On the cool side Wayne Russell and I surveyed through three sumps and a couple hundred meters of nice air-filled passage to a fourth sump. I pushed that sump a few meters to where it became impassably low. Maybe it has washed open since then. It would be worth checking soon after the next hurricane passes through. The warm stream sump is sometimes freedove along the right wall to get into a little more air-filled passage. About 40 years ago there was a tragic drowning when someone missed that passage. Continuing underwater past that is a pit. Wayne found a pit but had problems with his ears at depth so I was the first down it. It dropped to -13 m and then the passage turned horizontally into a large, lovely passage. As I recall, I had 60 or 100 m of line in my reel before it ran out. On a later trip, I found some small airbells then the passage rose into air at the base of a breakdown slope. I don't recall why I didn't explore it, and never managed to get back, but someone else (Creature? I don't remember) has since checked it and couldn't find a way on. I believe I wrote this all up with more details and a fresher memory long ago for the AMCS Newsletter. I still have the survey notes if someone wants to resurvey the cave. Wayne planned on having the map redrawn but he died a little later diving in Jacob's Well (look at the back issues of the Texas Caver on the Karst Information Portal for that story). George Sent from my mobile phone George Veni, Ph.D. Executive Director National Cave and Karst Research Institute 400-1 Cascades Avenue Carlsbad, New Mexico 88220-6215 USA Office: 575-887-5517 Mobile: 210-863-5919 Fax: 575-887-5523 gv...@nckri.org www.nckri.org Original message From: David via Texascavers Date: 2014/11/11 14:52 (GMT-07:00) To: CaveTex Subject: [Texascavers] Las Grutas de Carrizal I strongly believe that the most constructive potential project for Mexican and US cavers to work together on a long term project is at Las Grutas de Carrizal. Has anyone recently tried to push the leads ? How accurate and complete is the map ? What other caves are within hiking distance ? A hot-tub could easily setup, although the water at the entrance is mostly just watered-down bat excrement. Imagine getting the water from the upsteam sump to fill the hot-tub. Camping is secluded and there is shade. I am certain that the Monarch Butterflies refuge there at the spring. My personal opinion is there are too many bats in the cave, and they should go find another nearby cave where they won't contaminate the water source. Imagine the cave cleared of all that dusty guano ? There could be some picturesque photos to take. Imagine a good gate on the cave. Imagine a caver hut outside like at Punkin and Deep. David Locklear ___ 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] Las Grutas de Carrizal
I first went to Carrizal in December of 1984 with 5 other newbie Aggie Cavers, and was the least experienced of the group.There was a large sign posted out front warning of danger in the cave that was old and faded. I once had a picture of the sign, but it is probably lost.Didn't it say "Histoplasmosis" on it ?? We hiked a mile in from the gate, as we had no idea how to get a key, only to find a family living about 200 yards from the entrance.I went on several more trips to Carrizal for about 10 years after that, and they were all fun and uneventful.I have no idea if any of us got sick, and if we did we thought we had the flu. There was a time in the late 80's, where I had no problem getting a key to the gate, but could not find cavers to go, or I didn't have vacation time, or had some other caving related event to attend that was higher priority. Sidenote: The ladder that was recently used in the Kiwi Sink Dig was purchased in 1995 for checking out some shadows in the ceiling of the passage in Carrizal.After a monumental effort to purchase and deliver the ladder to the entrance by myself, the 3 other members of my team mutined and would not help me carry the ladder the rest of the way into the cave. ( Disclaimer: the ladder is a heavy duty aluminum ladder consisting of two - 20 foot pieces. ) I can remember planning to carry it myself, as they sat around the campfire relaxing with their cerveza mexicana ( Modelo or Tecate ?? ). I think I went back in the cave alone to re-check the shadows once last time, and accepted the reality that I could not safely get the ladder in place without their help. So I joined them around the campfire. I thought about donating the ladder then to the town of Candela, so I wouldn't have to haul it back to Houston, but decided it would be more practical to find a caving use for it somewhere.The ladder was eventually delivered from Houston to Kiwi Sink on the top of my tiny Honda Fit. I paid for the ladder hanging Christmas lights on 2-story houses. That trip was the last time I was in Carrazal, I think. Sometime earlier, around 1993, I was with 2 Houston cavers, Pam Ozkowski ( Spencer Woods wife ) and Ralph Batche ( R.I.P. ), in the cave. There was another trip about that time with caver George Sanders, so ask him about Carrizal. He drove to the entrance in his Geo Metro.After watching that off-road feat, I learned the benefits of a short-wheel base and small vehicle width, for travelling the backroads of the Sierra Madres. David Locklear ___ 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] Las Grutas de Carrizal
I logged 700km in the rural Andes of Ecuador driving a Fiat Uno and a Suzuki that was even smaller. (Small) size matters! Andrew G. Gluesenkamp, Ph.D. 700 Billie Brooks Drive Driftwood, Texas 78619 (512) 799-1095 a...@gluesenkamp.com From: David via Texascavers To: CaveTex Sent: Wednesday, November 12, 2014 1:12 PM Subject: Re: [Texascavers] Las Grutas de Carrizal I first went to Carrizal in December of 1984 with 5 other newbie Aggie Cavers, and was the least experienced of the group.There was a large sign posted out front warning of danger in the cave that was old and faded.I once had a picture of the sign, but it is probably lost.Didn't it say "Histoplasmosis" on it ?? We hiked a mile in from the gate, as we had no idea how to get a key, only to find a family living about 200 yards from the entrance.I went on several more trips to Carrizal for about 10 years after that, and they were all fun and uneventful.I have no idea if any of us got sick, and if we did we thought we had the flu. There was a time in the late 80's, where I had no problem getting a key to the gate, but could not find cavers to go, or I didn't have vacation time, or had some other caving related event to attend that was higher priority. Sidenote: The ladder that was recently used in the Kiwi Sink Dig was purchased in 1995 for checking out some shadows in the ceiling of the passage in Carrizal. After a monumental effort to purchase and deliver the ladder to the entrance by myself, the 3 other members of my team mutined and would not help me carry the ladder the rest of the way into the cave. ( Disclaimer: the ladder is a heavy duty aluminum ladder consisting of two - 20 foot pieces. ) I can remember planning to carry it myself, as they sat around the campfire relaxing with their cerveza mexicana ( Modelo or Tecate ?? ). I think I went back in the cave alone to re-check the shadows once last time, and accepted the reality that I could not safely get the ladder in place without their help. So I joined them around the campfire. I thought about donating the ladder then to the town of Candela, so I wouldn't have to haul it back to Houston, but decided it would be more practical to find a caving use for it somewhere.The ladder was eventually delivered from Houston to Kiwi Sink on the top of my tiny Honda Fit. I paid for the ladder hanging Christmas lights on 2-story houses. That trip was the last time I was in Carrazal, I think. Sometime earlier, around 1993, I was with 2 Houston cavers, Pam Ozkowski ( Spencer Woods wife ) and Ralph Batche ( R.I.P. ), in the cave. There was another trip about that time with caver George Sanders, so ask him about Carrizal. He drove to the entrance in his Geo Metro.After watching that off-road feat, I learned the benefits of a short-wheel base and small vehicle width, for travelling the backroads of the Sierra Madres. David Locklear ___ 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
