ADAM HAYDOCK

The idea of cave exploration has been on the fingertips for the curious reader, inspiring a bit of question bearing eye candy and a bit of internal projection that seeks to understand the world under our own surface meaning that we have become comfortable with. 

This recent advent of public assumed discovery into the world of caving has brought out emotions ranging from uncovering a semi secretive society of underworld explores to imitating action for some that have found a connected familiarity to the idea of cave exploration, even a bit of anxiety for the outliers wandering eye.


 The idea of cave exploration, for me, is a lifestyle of seeking to understand and the seemingly endless pursuit to understand our history.

The geological, hydro logical, and anthropological history of human being and our underground has been a obvious forefront to answering questions that appetize our curiosity.


 Now I say appitize, because not all questions are obvious or answered, and in fact more questions arise after new discoveries are uncovered.


 Could this create a infinitive crazy eight loop of endless pursuit and entrap the curiously adventurous? 

 I think it could but the observance of this audit can keep our pursuits realistic and keep us pursuing a  reasonable obtainable goal, S.M.A.R.T. goal.

 This is where the organized expeditions and clear measurable objectives can also be the answering balance towards this endless pursuit for the chase in new discoveries and efficient and realistic exploration that generates quality results.

 Some can say some of us chase the feeling of a new discovery, like chasing a feeling or a drug for that matter.

 I say its prudent to observe these emotions to stay present to the moment while allowing the feeling of discovery to be a mechanism for our objective instead of our self indulgence. 

 Now that we are all present to the moment and observing our mechanisms we call emotions, lets explore deeper into what we find purposeful and fulfilling within the world of cave exploration.

There is generations of exploration to occur in many regions of the world and we cant get it all done in a lifetime, its just not going to happen. 

When birds find their own feather efficiency and effectiveness can occur that brings tall order results into a more obtainable resolve.

 That being said, expedition groups with similar standards of quality and mindset can find synergy and effective teamwork and create an overall sense of greatness among themselves and the environment around them. 

one aspect of cave exploration is to access the very places that dauntingly appear to be inaccessible.

 The employment of technical rope access equipment and proficient technique not only becomes a requirement but become a risk management matrix for assessing risk thresholds and the rick appetite of the group. 

Now lets throw in idea of remote and isolated living quarters ( cave camping) where essential resources are required for hygiene and health.

 This continues to add a level of planning and understanding that most may not realize until they are waking up from previous days 12 hr trip down 500 meters of rope and the environmental condition is visually, audibly, and sensationally, exactly the same as you went to bed with.

Sensory deprivation eventually occurs and increased risk can be statistically plotted for the UN prepared. 

Now lets throw in scuba diving.

A lot of us know and understand the pleasures of diving and also have learned about the dangers of diving, and for the same paradigm of reasoning in the world of cave diving.

Incorporate all of these elements and it can be a dangerous caustic cocktail of destruction but in the right hands with the right preparation, this tools can propel exploration into places that most my not have fathoms to exist. 

The Rio Uluapan is one of these places that demand its visitors come with a level of preparation that acutes attention to dive detail, mixed gas management, rope access, and deep diving decompression procedures.

Once they got into the water and continued on into their dive, we headed back to get some photos of the dry portion of the cave.

We set up some shots on the traverse lines and set up a few shots above the falls as well as at sump two.


Before we knew it, the divers were coming back and at their 20-10ft decompression stops.


We could see the divers laying down on their decompression stops while they read waterproof novels and slowly allow the off gassing of nitrogen out of their system.


After their last 45 minute deceompression stop, they surfaced and reported that they laid another 900 ft of line and the cave continues deeper.


There were sections of the cave where it ascended to a shallower depth and descended back down which creates a more complicated decompression procedure, rather a more lengthy dive.


After a 2 hour surface interval, we connected their gear to a trolley line and passed the gear along to the top of sump the falls and eventually descending all the gear back down to the water front.


Even though this took some time to complete, moving the gear over to sump 1 with a trolley system was a lot easier than hauling all the gear to sump 1.


Eventually we made it back to sump 1 and prepared for our dive back through the sump and out the entrance resurgence.


I was in a 5mm wet suit farmer john with the 3mm wetsuit top tucked inside the farmer john and I was starting to get a bit chilled. Now being in Vegas for a few years has made me a bit soft with the cold but I think this wet suit configuration worked out.  I also had 5mm boots and 3 mm hood.


I held on to zebs crotch strap and after replacing the broken line, we headed back out through sump 1.  This time around I looked up to have a look at the massive submerged passage and realized how big this passage was.



After 15 minutes we popped out into the entrance and you could smell the organics in the air with the moonlight shining through the hanging gardens at the entrance and illuminating the cerro rabon in the background.



The days continuing the team kept pushing deeper into the Rio Uluapan with continuing success until they reached a point where their re breathers and gas mixtures would not support a deeper dive so they aborted the dive.



I want to thank everyone on the team that helped to support and develop this expedition into the success that we found with it. I also want to thank Tony Akers and Mike Frazier for there dedication and assistance with securing permission for the dive.  I also want to thank Fernando Hernandez for assisting us in the political field for our successful agreement with the Communeros, and the city of Aluatla, and Japapa.



We are looking forward to another successful expedition next year in the Cerro Rabon.




Video of scooter diving through sump 1

Miles of boulder hoping and steep ankle rolling trail access gives south canyon a natural filter for crowds looking for greener pastures and paved walkways.

 South Canyon is a one of the largest canyon tributaries in the Grand Canyon / marble canyon range.

Once you cross over the rim of  South Canyon you will be in Grand Canyon National Park territory so permits are required for overnight use.

There are a few routes to get to the river using south canyon and the nearby bedrock canyon.

We opted to go down bedrock canyon so we could by-pass miles of boulder hoping and wash walking.

We started at the top of the UPS route for bedrock canyon, which a very direct and a very steep route into the bedrock canyon. 

The UPS route actually cuts out most of bedrock and takes you to the confluence of bedrock and south canyons. 

We followed the rim of bedrock canyon and entered at the trail end of bedrock. 

We encountered some short but pretty supai sandstone "narrow" sections. until it opened back up again.

Afterwards we found some sketchy down climbs that did have rap anchors on them but we were able to negotiate the down climbs with everyone on the team and lower packs. 

After some boulder hopping we passed the UPS route and got into south canyon . 

We found that the potholes were full of water since it rained recently so we filled our containers and continued down canyon.

about 30-45 minutes later, we started to enter into the redwall limestone layer and the canyon started to narrow up.

Andy and James came with me while the others went around the obvious trail down to the beach.

They did not bring wet suits and they did not want to get their gear wet so they took the high road while we suited up for the narrow corridors.

We encountered some easy down climbs a a few difficult downclimbs through out the narrow section.

Although it was short, I was surprised to see how beautiful the narrows were !

We found that there was one small swimming and the others were waist to neck deep for a short period of time.

the narrows meandered right to the beach and the last drop was on a fixed line.

Once we got to the beach we unpacked and dried out a few items just as the rest of the team was coming down the canyon.

Woohoo! We made it to the beach and we had the beach to ourselves. 

After setting up camp we headed over to check out Stanton cave and Vaseys paradise.

Stanton cave was our first stop and its was quite the cave entrance right on the wall.

This cave is gated and protected by the park service for its significance so please respect this place when you visit.

Our next visit was over to Vaseys paradise.

This was a beautiful water fall coming out of the wall with a lush green area around the base of the shoreline where the water enters the Colorado river. 

Afterwards, we headed back to camp for dinner and a chill night for our hike out the following day.

We were going to bring pack rafts to head down to red wall caverns and head up to other canyons but we did not have time and the team decision was to just go down to the beach and back up. 

The following day we headed back up and went over to the UPS route for our exit. 

The sun was hitting the wall in some interesting ways and gave for some great light on the morning hike out. 

We took a casual pace and headed up to the UPS route while filtering water at the confluence.

Finally we made it to the vicious looking UPS trail, 1800 feet of steep boulder hiking and scrambling up the canyon.

The first third of the hike was steep but it was all that bad.

There was some grappling but not a whole lot and before we knew it, we were back up on the supai.

The last two thirds had some switch back hiking up a trail which was not bad than we got to a loose and steep section in between the spurs.

This section was just a bit more difficult but not bad at all.

Than we got to the last kaibab section which was grappling up boulders and some small exposed places to climb.

The views were fantastic as we hiked up and finally made it to the cars in a 1 1/2 from the bottom of the UPS route.

South canyon is a great introduction to grand canyon hiking and canyoneering and I highly recommend it as a first stop to get into the grand canyon.This and all other blog postings are for personal documentation and group memorable experiences and is not to be use for any official beta or route finding purposes.