I hiked up almost two and a half miles of mountainous limestone terrain to an elevation of around 8 to 9,000ft. to seek out the photogenic Heaven's Gate Cave in Utah. I morning was clear with a thin scent of pine in the air and blue skies across the ridge.  It was quite the hike to get to the this 170ft. hole in the ground, especially after negotiating some steep scree slopes and valleys without losing too much elevation.

The hike itself was more than a couple miles but after descending to the slabby limestone basin at  9,000ft of elevation, the gaping hole in the ground started to appear.  The walk itself was through some beautiful alpine flower patches and dry dusty pine trees with sap dripping from a few and others standing proud as they show a weathered personality from all of the hot summers and snow piling winters this region endeavors.

This cave reminded me of Conley hole except for the snowcone at the bottom and the 34 degree temps inside the cave. I should have brought some dye and would have turned this snow cone into the largest slurpie on the planet.  I rigged to the near-by tree and attached our bags together so we could have some rope padding from the edge while this semi static rope dangled into the darkness. 

The pit itself looked a bit intimidating from the top as you stare into the pit and admire the echo that reverbed for a noticeable amount of time in the gapping blackness, but once on rope, the ambient light shines in and the free drop is only about 40ft down to a ledgy section than a quick 10-15 ft drop to the snow cone and it goes down to the bottom.

This is just one massive hole in the ground with some ice formations at the bottom and a couple pits behind me that continued down to terminal ends.  There is not much more to it but for what it is worth, this pit is a nice one for bouncing.

I snapped a few photos and headed back out of the cave so we could make our journey down the scree slope to White Pine Lake and back to the Tony Grove parking lot in time to get back home and get ready for the week.

This is one of the few caves that I want to come back to and take a couple more photos of in some different perspectives and locations at the bottom.