ADAM HAYDOCK

SHIPWRECK OF THE NORTH BAY AND THE ALBANY

June 23, 2014

SHIPWRECK OF THE NORTH BAY

It was a long ride to get up to Alpena Michigan after work and with losing an hour on the road due to the eastern time thing, it made me wonder if they think they can change daylight savings time, but they cant change the time zones?....move them a bit more east or lets just go back to the counting moons or something...silly president. We got to Alpena around 2am and unfortunately woke up our other two dive buddies as we banged on the door to get into the cottage due to no keys. opps..

SHIPWRECK OF THE ALBANY

We woke a bit LATE and made our way over to the shop, got breakfast, and made our way over to the harbor to make our first two dives of the day. The waves were about a foot by three feet and cloudy but optimistic conditions so it was a go. We get on the water leave the harbor and as we are leaving the harbor the boat starts to run into some challenges. We ended up having to turn around in a plume of carbon smoke back to the harbor to assess the situation and begin the repair. After some disagreements and some challenges within the groups opinion on the assessment and the execution of the repair we decided to leave that behind and scope out some prospective dive sites. After a while I was able to find a couple of shore dives in Presque Isle which were nice to swim out to and check out.

SHIPWRECK OF THE ALBANY

The first wreck is called the Albany which came to shore in the early 1900s and was quickly torn apart by storms preceding its resting place with no lives lost. Her engine was salvaged a few years after her foundering. The next shipwreck was the North bay wreck which has some unique history in itself that includes a gentleman who was sawing up the shipwrecks wood for furniture. He ended up getting arrested and the north bay wreck got its name. I am sure that would have been a pretty penny for him back in the day.

Shipwreck of the North Bay

This wreck was nestled in a super calm section inside of a bay in Presque Isle. It was a nice place to not only swim out to and relax while enjoying the loons speaking to each other about the unusual human swimming in the frigid cold water. Both of the wrecks were keelson remains, floor boarding, and parts of side panel and haul skeletal remains held together with fasteners.

Shipwreck of the North Bay

Its fun to swim out to the shipwrecks and check out what is out there as well as to learn about the history of the ships themselves to see how great the workmanship and time that was put in to build some of these boats.

SHIPWRECK OF THE ALBANY

The day itself turned out to be a good one as we were able to do two shore free dives and scope out some interesting places but the next day is going to be the main event as we are planning to visit the Defiance and the Typo.

FLICKR: https://www.flickr.com/photos/exploration-worldwide/sets/72157644927476187/

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DONALDSON-BRONSON CAVES SPRING MILL

June 10, 2014

Large Room Inside Donaldson Cave Indaina

Sunday morning we got up early to start off on going into two caves right on the property of Spring Mill State Park, Donaldson and Bronson caves . We show up to the office where they keep the boats for their tours into upper twin cave and check in with the staff. We continued down into the section where the two caves connect from the collapsed sink and to our left is upper twin and to our right is Bronson cave, or so I thought it was Bronson. We enter this cave and continue down the passage looking back at the nice waterfall next to the entrance.

Entrance looking out from Lower Twin Cave Indiana

We start swimming in this water and eventually come up to a sumped out plug where there are huge logs and lots of debris clogging up the low air space. We continue to search for a way around this and started to move the debris away from the cave and but this apparently did not work and there was too much debris in the way.

inside Lower Twin Cave Indiana

We were confused by this and decided to exit the cave and go to the Donaldson entrance where we knew the cave was open.

Entrance to Donaldson Cave

We drove up to the parking lot and walked to the entrance of Donaldson cave where we first explored the side passages of the cave before entering the main river passage. we climbed over a waterfall and got to a second waterfall that appeared to be a bit more challenging.

Donaldson Cave from the inside out.

Eventually we traversed the side wall and climbed around the waterfall to tie a handline for anyone else that needed to get to the top of the falls. I should have attempted to climb the falls as later we found out they were quite easy to climb out.

Donaldson Cave

We continue on crossing over some funnel falls and fast moving water until we got to another swimming section.

Donaldson Cave

This cave was a lot of fun as we got to swim upstream and around until we got to a walking stream passage that was mainly upright walking. After w awhile we finally made it to the large borehole room of Donaldson Cave, This room was huge!!! Prob the biggest room I have ever seen in Indiana and one of the biggest I have seen in the Midwest. I was pleasantly surprised to see all this water fun, large rooms, and fast walk and swimming passages. Lots of fun.

Large Room inside Donaldson Cave Indiana

We continue on upstream where at times we were swimming and at other times we were walking in stream passage.

Swimming passage in Donaldson Cave Indiana

As we were walking upstream I could feel the air temp warming up and the cave started to smell like fresh flora, seconds later a dim light was peaking through the left side and it was an opening to a collapsed sink!! We found ourselves outside and we were dumb founded as to where we were. It turns out we were in the right cave but initially we though we entered Bronson cave but instead we entered Lower Twin cave. We stopped and had lunch to think about where we were as hikers observed us on the wooden deck like we were apart of the feature..."look honey, confused cavers" I am sure they were thinking that. So upper twin cave connects to lower twin cave which is plugged and must keep going to the exit we saw in the collapsed sink that we could have entered to reach the plugged sump on the other side which must be the Bronson entrance to Lower twin cave.

Donaldson Cave

Eventually we went back the way we came and snapped photos and swam out of the cave. I was so pleased with the caves geological and karst features as well as with the DNR for allowing us restricted access into this and the other caves we ventured into. To learn more about how to access these caves please visit the Spring Mill State Park website and contact their local office for more information.

Large Room Inside Donaldson Cave Indiana

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CAVE RIVER VALLEY RIVER CAVE

June 10, 2014

Adam Haydock in River Cave in Cave River Valley Indiana

After a break outside we went up stream passing a series of nice small waterfalls till we got to the entrance of river Cave. This cave is not as long as Endless cave but the passages appeared to be larger in size.

Entrance of River Cave in Cave River Valley Indiana

The entrance was rather interesting which consisted of three pools cavers had to swim through with the depth appearing to be around 6 to 7 feet in some places. We had a life boat and some of of us wore dive fins to shuttle non swimmers and gear in the raft. Once we got to the last pool we ditched out fins and boat to traverse through the cave.

River Cave in Cave River Valley Indiana

We continue to follow the large stream passage and go through large rooms with monster breakdown boulders we had to climb over. I was impressed with this cave as it reminded me of a horizontal TAG cave with these large boulders and the passage we were traversing through.

River Cave Indiana

We continue on into a duck walking section and come up to one of the longest straight line passages I have ever seen, I believe this passage is around 600 ft in length and has a stream passage to traverse through which was impressive to see. the passage started to get smaller and the water got deeper as we got towards the back of the cave. We came to a small breakdown section with formation room and eventually came up on a section where we had to squeeze through a waterfall to get to the final section of the cave. We could hear the water below us raging away but the breakdown around us prevented us from continuing. There was a spot that appeared to be a potential dig but we decided to turn back and head out of the cave.

Exit of River Cave in Cave River Valley Indiana

This was a fantastic trip and a fantastic day of caving so we want to thank the DNR for allowing Restricted access to these special places. We had a blast and made sure we collected a bunch of garbage from the cave that was brought in from run off.

At the entrance of River Cave in Cave River Valley Indiana

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CAVE RIVER VALLEY ENDLESS CAVE

June 10, 2014

Endless Cave Cave River Valley Indiana

Cave River Valley is situated in Indiana just south of Mitchell Indiana. The Department of Natural Resources just started granting access to previously closed caves on state property. We were able to get permission to visit these caves and bring out some garbage that was washed in from previous watershed. We took our time for once to get to cave river valleys caves which was nice as I'm usually maximizing every potential minute on a caving trip. The first cave we went to visit was endless cave. This cave is just over a mile in length and great for a beginner trip.

Endless Cave Cave River Valley Indiana

The entrance to this cave was large for Indiana standards and had a perennial flow of water in the form of a stream coming out of the cave.

Endless Cave Cave River Valley Indiana

The gate was unlocked as we past a karst window after the entrance which illuminated the first 100 ft of the cave itself.

Karst Window in Endless Cave Indiana

We continued to walk upstream meandering around the stream bends and traversing into side passages.

ENDLESS CAVE INDIANA

We continue on over large breakdown boulders and get to a section where we had to duck walk. Some of the group stopped and started to turn around and a few of us continued to push forward through the water and stones to the walking passage. Crinoid fossils were spotted along with other shell like unidentified fossils, some of these were nice specimens embedded into the rock.

Horn Corals Endless Cave Cave River Valley Indiana

We continue to walk and traverse over boulders passing the formation room and eventually coming to an army crawl in water passage with stone notating the en of the cave. Ahead of me at this point the cave was less than a foot in height.

We turn back to observe the formation room and eventually exit the cave. This cave was pretty easy and straightforward yet it was still nice to see this walking cave. We head over to the other side of the spur, have lunch and head over to River Cave.

Endless Cave Cave River Valley Indiana

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SOUTH MANITOU ISLAND SLEEPING BEAR SAND DUNES SHIPWRECKS

May 30, 2014

South Manitou Island

It has been a lot of traveling the past week going from all over Costa Rica to Chicago and now I'm on my way up to Michigan's sleeping bear sand dunes where two islands are located about 10 miles east of the mainland.

South Manitou Island looking at the mainland at Sleeping bear dunes

The ferry boat took it's time at a rate of about 4-5 knots stopping at the north I and first than dropping off the remaining group on the south. The islands were created by glacial deposits of sand and glacial run off from the last ice age. Hiking around the Island was rather nice especially on the shoreline but the water was pretty cold!!! I estimated the water temperature to be between 39 and 42 degrees Fahrenheit which was a cold burning sensation when you got in the water. Even with a full 7mm wetsuit it was still pretty cold to swim in.

South Manitou Island

Around the bend were a number of dead trees where loons gathered which was interesting to hear the sounds that they made.

South Manitou Island

On this shoreline the shipwreck of the Francisco morazan lies at rest from 1960 when it foundered on the shore line swimming out there wasn't too difficult but as the water temperature dropped the clarity I the water increased and it was literally like being in crystal clear ocean water.

francisco morazan Shipwreck

Maybe even clearer than an ocean, but the visibility was pretty amazing!! I swam through the inner lower haul of the shipwrecks engine room and other parts of the ship. I continued to find the shipwreck of the Walter frost which the Francisco hit as she was finding her final resting place.

francisco morazan Shipwreck

Continuing down the shoreline billions of zebra muscle shells littered the shoreline in a mass grave as they rolled up and down the shoreline with the waves increasing in size as the winds started to pick up.

Dead Zebra Mussels

In the distance I could see the dunes and as we got closer, the peaks of these dunes became more defined. They were a lot bigger than I thought they would be on this island which was a nice surprise.

South Manitou Island

Climbing the dunes was not much work and at the top of the dunes the overlook into Lake Michigan looked like an ocean and the clear waters revealed color blue contours of the lake bottom below. It was beautiful and I was very impressed with this island. Continuing down the dunes spread out in a desert of sorts with dry warm air blowing over the lip of the sand dunes.

South Manitou Island

We are now in the afternoon and I wanted to attempt to find the shipwreck of the three brothers before the sun got to low for visibility. Making a B line through the woods was not too difficult so I made a bearing and set a course for the lighthouse on the other side of the island. Eventually we came up on a trail that made it easier to get to the other side.

Once on the other side I attempted to ind the shipwreck three times without success as there were no directions or mooring buoys to mark the location of the wreck. Regardless it is out there is is suppose to be a pretty nice shore dive.