Saddle Butte Day 3

My Sunday really began probably around 2 or 3 am.  I was awakened to the sound of yelling, and a bright orange blow.  I unzipped my tent and saw that Sam and Mike Loomis's tent was on fire.  Everyone was running around working to put it out.  I put on my shoes and went over, but by that time it was under control.  So I went back to bed.  The next morning I was again the first one up.  I cooked my breakfast, and then as everyone else woke up we saw the full extent of the tent damage.

This picture shows just one side.  But the story went like this.  Sam and Mike had a propane heater in their giant tent (first mistake).  They had left it running when they went to sleep.  During the night we had a more-than-usual-powerful gust of wind come through and it ruffled things around.  Including their tent.  And it blew a chair and coats over onto the heater, which caused the fire.  Both of the brothers were lucky that they were not harmed.

After breakfast was finished Scott helped me out with my vertical gear.  He let me borrow one of his chest harnesses which was better suited than what I was using.  Then he rigged the rope to descend into Fortymile Cave!  There would be two drops in this cave, both about 15-20 feet in height.  The second drop would have a nasty lip to negotiate.

Brent went down and began to rig the second drop.  Scott dropped down, and then told me to come on down.

Mike and Errin checked me at the top and made sure I was doing everything correctly.  I did have to undo a couple bars on my rack though.  I'm used to being able to use all my bars on the ropes I've dropped on, but this rope wasn't that case.  But I made the first drop without any incident.  I began walking down to the second drop and I heard a rattle.  Looking over behind a rock in the "twilight zone" I saw a small rattlesnake hiding.  That made rattle snake #2 for me on this trip.

Soon all of the group members that were going on this vertical cave trip joined us.  Matt and Kara were doing a survey project, before Matt went home.  So they didn't join us.  Brent soon had the second drop rigged and he and Scott, and a couple others descended, before Errin told me to go.  It went well, until I reached the lip.  At that point I couldn't keep my feet against any rock.  I couldn't just hang free because of the lip or I would flip over backwards.  But I was able to get onto my knees and lean back a bit further and slowly let the rope through my rack.  I ended up scraping the top of the rack on the rock a little bit, but I made it to the bottom pretty good.

From that point on, it was pure amazement.  Fortymile Cave was the most impressive cave of the entire trip. I even found a clump of pure gypsum growing.  Scott looked at it and said it is the highest quality gypsum you can find growing in a cave, just like he saw in Lechuguilla.

There were lots of little areas along the walls with tiny lava formations.  In some places there were some nice "lava soda straws"

I went off by myself and journey to the very back of the cave, signed the register, and then waited for everyone else to arrive.  Brent was the last one, and he took a pretty nice group photo.

After that, we made the trek out.  Jeffery was the first one out, followed by Scott and Mike.  I went up the first drop and got to the lip.  Then I ran into trouble, like I knew I would.  My croll ascenders would not let me get up the lip.  I had to use a webbing ladder that Brent rigged to help me out.  I definitely need to get a handheld ascender to make obstacles like that easier to negotiate.  But the important thing was, I got out.  The second ascent went much smoother.  There was nothing difficult about it.  Ned came up right behind me.

It took a while for Brent and Errin to come out of the cave.  They had stayed and worked on taking photographs.  Errin had found a mummified bobcat under a ledge.  Somebody from the BLM (Bureuo Land Management) put rocks around it to protect it.  But when they did emerge, Ned and Errin packed up their truck, and then helped load up my stuff and drove me back out to my car.

It was definitely a new experience caving in lava caves.  It can't compare to limestone.  The two are so vastly different.  But it was an excellent trip, and nice to make some new caver friends, and see what my caving future holds!