Last night I was chatting with a gal who is about to take GUE Rec 1 & a C2/T2 friend who took Fundies with my same instructor. Both conversations sparked memories of pre-fundies jitters, my early dreams of seeing the cenotes, my doubts that I’d ever have the skills to actually pass fundies, and serious doubts that I’d ever have the skills/courage to dive the beautiful decorated Mexican caves. So I figured I’d write up a short report about our recent cave trip in hopes of encouraging some of you with cave diving dreams/aspirations who are just launching on this path.
Fundies was around dive 250 and February 2010 --- fast forward nearly 1,000 dives GUE C1, T1 and C2 class & a whole lot of diving/training -- to December 21, 2014.
A GREAT CAVE DIVING VACATION! So worth all the effort!!
“Heading back home for the holidays” — traveling to Cancún, Quintana Roo from Orlando International Airport (MCO. ) Lamont, my cave buddy will arrive shortly from Seattle!
Day 1 - Shaking off the rust
The biggest question is: Is Lamont’s ear infection cleared up enough to dive? Is the dizzyness gone? We opt for a lazy restful first day in our favorite nearby shallow cave: Dos Palmas to find out.
It’s late afternoon when we get to the quiet little cenote. Its been a while since we visited: nine months since our last trip there and 2.5 years since i moved back to the US (after 6 months living in Mx). But some places are timeless. The same beautiful family greets as us as old friends. The cenote deck is remolded a bit and the endangered spider monkey set free on a reserve, but everything else at Dos Palmas is pretty much the same
.
I wipe the fine layer of dust from storage off my jet fins and primary reel . We carefully check our equipment, climb into our drysuits and head down the wooden stairs to the cenote. I can’t get into the caves fast enough! A quick gear check on the surface, and soon we are kicking upstream (into a cave we’ve seen many times). A quick jump takes us to the closest enchanted forest of delicate stalactites - I hover quietly (as in a temple) soaking it up! Now I’m home!! Ahhh! Two hours later everything feels synched up. Great news to hear Lamont’s ears are fine! With huge smiles we surface & give a high-five. It’s going to be a great trip!
Resisting returning to our favorite caves, we decided to dedicate this trip to exploring new to us cave & lines! First up is: MinoTauro!
Day 2 – Bumped into JP Bresser at ZG who gives us a recent stick map of the cave. Thanks JP! We drive down the highway, pass through a time-weathered gate, down the bumpy dusty road, past a few scruffy barking dogs. We pay a small fee, sign a log and (in broken Spanish) assure the owners we know what we are doing. With a bit of uncertainty, that comes with a new cave we quickly survey the site.
Rock steps, and a gentle dirt walk lead through the forest to the inviting crystal clear pool. We quickly spot the mainline and plunge down into the small opening. For the first 10 minutes or so the cave is tight, maybe 2-3' high in places, with a few pinches to negotiate through. We manage to wiggle through with stage and doubles so not that tight. A ways down the main line we jump onto a second line and glide into the most incredible halocline we’ve ever seen!
Intoxicating beauty beyond comprehension. Hundreds of tiny rainbows dance on the bottom of the cave from our lights. Blue water halocline passages that warp the mind, fossils, and outrageously beautiful black speleothems. Mind blowing! What a phenomenal cave! 300+ blissful minutes logged in this cave this trip! It’s one of our new favorite
Chilling in the Jungle on Christmas Day
Delicate stalactites and mites in so many passages; it looks like a winter ice palace covered with icicles! A typical day often goes like this: hike your gear down steps or maybe a forest path, then negotiate along a wooden walk way or perhaps a muddy pond shore line, balancing yourself from slipping as drysuit covered feet sink into mud beneath the burden of double tanks. Sediment stirs up, and the pond grows murky. A single line arrow and darkened line protrude from the coffee colored water. You finish your gear check and plan, click your light on, ok your buddy. Taking the line gently in your fingers, you negotiate the narrow entrance. It’s difficult to see the rock, the glow of your buddies light through the turbidity is comforting. You drop down through the poor vis, the dark tannic lingers like a smog hazed over sky, defining a divide on the wall and ceiling. Distinct stain lines on the decorations divide dark decorations from white beautiful pillars. You pause, check your pressure gauge, shake out your drysuit, do a flow check, ok your buddy, turn and like a soaring bird, glide into the crystal clear cenote water. Into an adventure of ancient fire remains, fossils, glowing stalactites, countless fragile decorations, etc. Magical!. Several caves, and 400+ more minutes of gliding through these incredible chambers!
Lots of time in the caves = time for a rest day! Off to the long bumpy deserted dirt road & my favorite beautiful desolate Mx Beaches — at Sian Ka'an Biosphere Reserve, Tulum, Mexico! Wind swept beaches, palm trees, and endless relaxation.
Back to the caves.
It continues to amaze me that every cave, every line, and sometimes every five minutes of each line are often so radically different. We kick through the beautiful black tortured landscapes of Black Forest in Camilio, and swim past otherworldly delicate and gnarled speleothems.
Large white piles of calcite rafts -- a stark contrast to gazillions of fragile black stalactites decorate the dark walls and ceilings. Later we kick a little farther down the main line to glide through the center of a spectacular big phreatic tube. We obediently turn on gas even though the cave is calling us deeper -- the "Grand Canyon." Awesome 100 minutes :cool2:!
Over a cold Corona and a beautiful sunset at Casa Cenote, we hatch a new plan! Time to check out a line we have been talking about forever.
It’s like swimming into the gaping yawn of a Leviathan. As you descend into the throat of Naharon, velvet darkness swirls around engulfing your senses. The tannic water and large cavernous chamber devour your light. Glimpses of dark walls, floor and rock peer out of velvet like blackness. Vague recollections of landmarks in my mind: out of the darkened gloom a pile of rock, a few distinct small stalagmites, a cave warning sign, a compass bearing, finally, the main line. A short kick through the stained, tortured decorations, brings us to another jump, more kicking to arrive at a second jump. Drop down through a small opening not knowing what awaits. Thrilling! My SAC rate spikes a little with my excitement!
Southwest Sacbe passage! Through the darkness into - absolutely gorgeous! We glide through the narrow passages, countless decorations along the narrow canyons all visually filtered by a mesmerizing halocline, the pounding sound of our bubbles escaping the passages adds to the intensity!
Nearly two hours of diving is not enough. Can’t wait to return!
We drop off empty tanks and stage to ZG early. Then pick up more. Inspired by Chris Le Maillot and Fred Devos, we set off on a new adventure! To me, entering in one cenote and surfacing somewhere else, feels like a mission accomplished! The underground traverse from Dos Ojos to Dos Palmas is a beautiful dive & Chris shares that the traverse continues downstream from Dos Palmas passing through several centoes, lots of beautiful formations to some random undeveloped muddy jungle cenote.
Ready set go! Armed with our normal gear and vague directions, we say hello to our friends at Dos Palmas, pet the centoe dog and slip back into the water, this time head downstream. Kicking with the flow we pass a string of cenotes, some developed some not. Many beautiful decorations and passages, about an hour later, we find the line end in a silty pond. It’s a muddy scramble up the slope with gear, there is a small dirt rock lined path but no indication of the main road, only jungle. Pausing, after a while we hear a car and the direction we should bush whack!
I’m off to hunt down our car, while Lamont drags gear from the jungle – it’ a random sight to see drysuit divers tumbling out of the dense green jungle walls onto the dirty road. Turns out I manage to hitch a ride with a cool local diver, so Lamont gets stuck with the short end of the straw – oops! Thanks Lamont! I cook a tasty diner that night, and he seems to forgive me .
Happy New Year! Great way to start out 2015! A chilled out morning & a fun cave dive at the Pit – a gaping cavernous hole in the ground reaching to 180ft? We hover in the deep clear water looking for the 40 ft cave passage. Slipping in to the cave passage for a short dive to check it out, we return to the Pit to explore the bottom. Hydrogen sulfide mist seethes like dry ice in a smoky 100 ft mystical layer. I glide through it’s reach as it snakes around dark stained rocks and gnarled black tree branches . Depths of 180feet and gaping chasms of the 300ft deep cave spanning out below remind me of an artists rendition of Hades. Surrealistic!
Just when I think the caves can't get better, they do! We are honored when our instructor Danny Riordan joins our team for my first double stage dive ever! It turns out diving two stages isn’t as intimidating as it looks! It’s a LONG kick through so much mind-blowingly beautiful cave: Clear blue water passages, white rock countless speleothems, several jumps & T’s, then deco. So much distance, so many beautiful geologic features! Love Mayan Blue!!!
One more day left to dive -- so many incredible lines to explore -- Picking the last dive of the trip is a challenge. As a trip decompression, we decide to return to MinoTauro with more gas and chill in those exquisite halocline pools. The blue glow is haunting, reminiscent of northern lights or some strange computer graphic effect from an alien movie. Otherworldly! We float side by side on the line for a while, just admiring the beauty of nature! A final 1.5 hours of Ahhhhh – so awesome :cool2:!
We are done early enough to say hi to our Mx Hermit Crab friends at one of our favorite local beaches
Our gear is drying – last night out in Puerto Aventuras before Just a 1.5 hour flight back to the states. We share some great Mx food with friends & plot our next return to the cenotes! Thanks to Lamont, Danny, Zero Gravity and to our GUE friends from around the world who made this a fantastic trip!
If you are just launching on this training path and have dreams/aspirations for cave. Admittedly, it took a ton of work to gain the skill to do these dives safely & there is so much more left to learn. But, reflecting back to all the pre-class jitters, gains, doubts and frustrations and many dives - it’s all so well worth the effort to experience these passages now!!! Totally excited for our next trip!! See you all in the Cenotes ;-)!
Fundies was around dive 250 and February 2010 --- fast forward nearly 1,000 dives GUE C1, T1 and C2 class & a whole lot of diving/training -- to December 21, 2014.
A GREAT CAVE DIVING VACATION! So worth all the effort!!
“Heading back home for the holidays” — traveling to Cancún, Quintana Roo from Orlando International Airport (MCO. ) Lamont, my cave buddy will arrive shortly from Seattle!
Day 1 - Shaking off the rust
The biggest question is: Is Lamont’s ear infection cleared up enough to dive? Is the dizzyness gone? We opt for a lazy restful first day in our favorite nearby shallow cave: Dos Palmas to find out.
It’s late afternoon when we get to the quiet little cenote. Its been a while since we visited: nine months since our last trip there and 2.5 years since i moved back to the US (after 6 months living in Mx). But some places are timeless. The same beautiful family greets as us as old friends. The cenote deck is remolded a bit and the endangered spider monkey set free on a reserve, but everything else at Dos Palmas is pretty much the same
. I wipe the fine layer of dust from storage off my jet fins and primary reel . We carefully check our equipment, climb into our drysuits and head down the wooden stairs to the cenote. I can’t get into the caves fast enough! A quick gear check on the surface, and soon we are kicking upstream (into a cave we’ve seen many times). A quick jump takes us to the closest enchanted forest of delicate stalactites - I hover quietly (as in a temple) soaking it up! Now I’m home!! Ahhh! Two hours later everything feels synched up. Great news to hear Lamont’s ears are fine! With huge smiles we surface & give a high-five. It’s going to be a great trip!
Resisting returning to our favorite caves, we decided to dedicate this trip to exploring new to us cave & lines! First up is: MinoTauro!
Day 2 – Bumped into JP Bresser at ZG who gives us a recent stick map of the cave. Thanks JP! We drive down the highway, pass through a time-weathered gate, down the bumpy dusty road, past a few scruffy barking dogs. We pay a small fee, sign a log and (in broken Spanish) assure the owners we know what we are doing. With a bit of uncertainty, that comes with a new cave we quickly survey the site.
Rock steps, and a gentle dirt walk lead through the forest to the inviting crystal clear pool. We quickly spot the mainline and plunge down into the small opening. For the first 10 minutes or so the cave is tight, maybe 2-3' high in places, with a few pinches to negotiate through. We manage to wiggle through with stage and doubles so not that tight
. A ways down the main line we jump onto a second line and glide into the most incredible halocline we’ve ever seen!Intoxicating beauty beyond comprehension. Hundreds of tiny rainbows dance on the bottom of the cave from our lights. Blue water halocline passages that warp the mind, fossils, and outrageously beautiful black speleothems. Mind blowing! What a phenomenal cave! 300+ blissful minutes logged in this cave this trip! It’s one of our new favorite
Chilling in the Jungle on Christmas Day
Delicate stalactites and mites in so many passages; it looks like a winter ice palace covered with icicles! A typical day often goes like this: hike your gear down steps or maybe a forest path, then negotiate along a wooden walk way or perhaps a muddy pond shore line, balancing yourself from slipping as drysuit covered feet sink into mud beneath the burden of double tanks. Sediment stirs up, and the pond grows murky. A single line arrow and darkened line protrude from the coffee colored water. You finish your gear check and plan, click your light on, ok your buddy. Taking the line gently in your fingers, you negotiate the narrow entrance. It’s difficult to see the rock, the glow of your buddies light through the turbidity is comforting. You drop down through the poor vis, the dark tannic lingers like a smog hazed over sky, defining a divide on the wall and ceiling. Distinct stain lines on the decorations divide dark decorations from white beautiful pillars. You pause, check your pressure gauge, shake out your drysuit, do a flow check, ok your buddy, turn and like a soaring bird, glide into the crystal clear cenote water. Into an adventure of ancient fire remains, fossils, glowing stalactites, countless fragile decorations, etc. Magical!. Several caves, and 400+ more minutes of gliding through these incredible chambers!
Lots of time in the caves = time for a rest day! Off to the long bumpy deserted dirt road & my favorite beautiful desolate Mx Beaches — at Sian Ka'an Biosphere Reserve, Tulum, Mexico! Wind swept beaches, palm trees, and endless relaxation.
Back to the caves.
It continues to amaze me that every cave, every line, and sometimes every five minutes of each line are often so radically different. We kick through the beautiful black tortured landscapes of Black Forest in Camilio, and swim past otherworldly delicate and gnarled speleothems.
Large white piles of calcite rafts -- a stark contrast to gazillions of fragile black stalactites decorate the dark walls and ceilings. Later we kick a little farther down the main line to glide through the center of a spectacular big phreatic tube. We obediently turn on gas even though the cave is calling us deeper -- the "Grand Canyon." Awesome 100 minutes :cool2:!
Over a cold Corona and a beautiful sunset at Casa Cenote, we hatch a new plan! Time to check out a line we have been talking about forever.
It’s like swimming into the gaping yawn of a Leviathan. As you descend into the throat of Naharon, velvet darkness swirls around engulfing your senses. The tannic water and large cavernous chamber devour your light. Glimpses of dark walls, floor and rock peer out of velvet like blackness. Vague recollections of landmarks in my mind: out of the darkened gloom a pile of rock, a few distinct small stalagmites, a cave warning sign, a compass bearing, finally, the main line. A short kick through the stained, tortured decorations, brings us to another jump, more kicking to arrive at a second jump. Drop down through a small opening not knowing what awaits. Thrilling! My SAC rate spikes a little with my excitement!
Southwest Sacbe passage! Through the darkness into - absolutely gorgeous! We glide through the narrow passages, countless decorations along the narrow canyons all visually filtered by a mesmerizing halocline, the pounding sound of our bubbles escaping the passages adds to the intensity!
Nearly two hours of diving is not enough. Can’t wait to return!
We drop off empty tanks and stage to ZG early. Then pick up more. Inspired by Chris Le Maillot and Fred Devos, we set off on a new adventure! To me, entering in one cenote and surfacing somewhere else, feels like a mission accomplished! The underground traverse from Dos Ojos to Dos Palmas is a beautiful dive & Chris shares that the traverse continues downstream from Dos Palmas passing through several centoes, lots of beautiful formations to some random undeveloped muddy jungle cenote.
Ready set go! Armed with our normal gear and vague directions, we say hello to our friends at Dos Palmas, pet the centoe dog and slip back into the water, this time head downstream. Kicking with the flow we pass a string of cenotes, some developed some not. Many beautiful decorations and passages, about an hour later, we find the line end in a silty pond. It’s a muddy scramble up the slope with gear, there is a small dirt rock lined path but no indication of the main road, only jungle. Pausing, after a while we hear a car and the direction we should bush whack!
I’m off to hunt down our car, while Lamont drags gear from the jungle – it’ a random sight to see drysuit divers tumbling out of the dense green jungle walls onto the dirty road
. Turns out I manage to hitch a ride with a cool local diver, so Lamont gets stuck with the short end of the straw – oops! Thanks Lamont! I cook a tasty diner that night, and he seems to forgive me .Happy New Year! Great way to start out 2015! A chilled out morning & a fun cave dive at the Pit – a gaping cavernous hole in the ground reaching to 180ft? We hover in the deep clear water looking for the 40 ft cave passage. Slipping in to the cave passage for a short dive to check it out, we return to the Pit to explore the bottom. Hydrogen sulfide mist seethes like dry ice in a smoky 100 ft mystical layer. I glide through it’s reach as it snakes around dark stained rocks and gnarled black tree branches . Depths of 180feet and gaping chasms of the 300ft deep cave spanning out below remind me of an artists rendition of Hades. Surrealistic!
Just when I think the caves can't get better, they do! We are honored when our instructor Danny Riordan joins our team for my first double stage dive ever! It turns out diving two stages isn’t as intimidating as it looks! It’s a LONG kick through so much mind-blowingly beautiful cave: Clear blue water passages, white rock countless speleothems, several jumps & T’s, then deco. So much distance, so many beautiful geologic features! Love Mayan Blue!!!
One more day left to dive -- so many incredible lines to explore -- Picking the last dive of the trip is a challenge. As a trip decompression, we decide to return to MinoTauro with more gas and chill in those exquisite halocline pools. The blue glow is haunting, reminiscent of northern lights or some strange computer graphic effect from an alien movie. Otherworldly! We float side by side on the line for a while, just admiring the beauty of nature! A final 1.5 hours of Ahhhhh – so awesome :cool2:!
We are done early enough to say hi to our Mx Hermit Crab friends at one of our favorite local beaches
Our gear is drying – last night out in Puerto Aventuras before Just a 1.5 hour flight back to the states. We share some great Mx food with friends & plot our next return to the cenotes! Thanks to Lamont, Danny, Zero Gravity and to our GUE friends from around the world who made this a fantastic trip!
If you are just launching on this training path and have dreams/aspirations for cave. Admittedly, it took a ton of work to gain the skill to do these dives safely & there is so much more left to learn. But, reflecting back to all the pre-class jitters, gains, doubts and frustrations and many dives - it’s all so well worth the effort to experience these passages now!!! Totally excited for our next trip!! See you all in the Cenotes ;-)!
Last edited:
