[trytryagain]

Very cool! It never occurred to me to try and open up a sinkhole.

I did a lot of caving in college and was intrigued by a small cave opening on our family’s farm near Mt Jackson. As kids we would drop small rocks into the hole and listen to the plunk, plunk, plink, plunk, sploosh! There is probably a ten foot pile of rocks down there now. The opening was just a little too small to fit inside, and the likely need for ropes dissuaded me from exploring further. But with an experienced team, hmmmm.

[Vicegrip]

Originally Posted by trytryagain

Very cool! It never occurred to me to try and open up a sinkhole.

I did a lot of caving in college and was intrigued by a small cave opening on our family’s farm near Mt Jackson. As kids we would drop small rocks into the hole and listen to the plunk, plunk, plink, plunk, sploosh! There is probably a ten foot pile of rocks down there now. The opening was just a little too small to fit inside, and the likely need for ropes dissuaded me from exploring further. But with an experienced team, hmmmm.

You still have the farm in the faimly?

[trytryagain]

Yep, belongs to my sister now.

[Chopper Dropper]

I see where this is going, Kurt is going to open it up, and find way better caverns than Lurray has!!
Dirk

[Vicegrip]

Originally Posted by trytryagain

Yep, belongs to my sister now.

You all want a team from NSS to come and evaluate the site? I know some people.

[86911TLCAB]

very cool VG...hope you have all discovered the next Luray cavern...smile

[cmartin]

cool

There was a segment on Outdoors MD a while ago on this topic. Sounded pretty cool until I saw some of the spaces. No chance I would fit in some of those holes. Plus, even if I did there is no chance I'd get in those holes. Pretty amazing to see someone squeeze through a ~18" gap to find a huge room not seen by man before. Really cool stuff.

[trytryagain]

Yeah. I remember one cave where we had to twist/squeeze through a single person size hole that was half filled with water. On the other side was an enormous room where your carbide lamps were not bright enough to see to the far end.

I’ll have to discuss access with my sister next time we get together. Might be possible.

[Vicegrip]

Originally Posted by trytryagain

Yeah. I remember one cave where we had to twist/squeeze through a single person size hole that was half filled with water. On the other side was an enormous room where your carbide lamps were not bright enough to see to the far end.

I’ll have to discuss access with my sister next time we get together. Might be possible.

You described the connection between Sennett cave and Thorin mountain cave. two of my fav caves rolled into one.

http://www.psc-cavers.org/stcc/Sinnett-ThornImages.html

The Sennett cave entrance is a duck under that is about 30 feet up a hill from a creek. You go in and the passages wind and change from flat to vert fissure and more. Some sections of the fissure you are straddling between two walls with 30 feet above you and 30 feet below you. One lead of many up the vert fissure leads to the Big Room. The cave floor is covered in breakdown from the ceiling. It used to be covered in many feet deep of bat guano but that was bagged and hand carried out during the civil war. It was a source of badly needed salt peter. Off the big room are many leads one lead starts out big and tapers down to a mud fill. The mud fill was dug out exposing a small P trap shaped lead that had a long tight sort of A shaped section that leads to the lower sections of Thorin mountain. Up the right lead and you come to 3 large dome shaped rooms filled with gypsum crystals.

We used to camp in the Big room and push leads for a couple of days at a time. The lower sections of Sennett has a river and waterfall and just past a real hard tricky lead is a 4 inch deep 30 feet wide crystal clear lake. Just think if folks did not dig out the connection and ether cave did not have its own opening. Ether a group of domed crystal covered rooms or a room that could hold a football field and on to rivers and waterfalls would be unknown.

You never know what is just past the next squeeze.

NSS folks are careful of peoples property if you should chose to let them take look. The above dig was at the request of the land owner. Should the cave prove to be interesting they would secure the sinkhole and install a grate to prevent unwanted trespass or accidental falls into an open hole.

[Vicegrip]

Yes, a tree makes a sound when it falls in the woods. Nature is (loudly) doing some ice powered tree trimming today. We are in the cloud line and the rain/fog is freezing on everything. Nice quiet ever so slight sound of tiny droplet rain and then CRACK! swoosh.. crash every few min. the Paper Birch along the drive is feeling a bit droopy today but the 100,000 little bud filled snow globes brighten the day a bit.