ADAM HAYDOCK

SALTS CAVE

February 02, 2013

Salts Cave, Indiana

We got in the truck and headed down to South central Indiana to visit a beautiful cave system called Salts Cave.

Scalloped walls in Salts Cave, Indiana

This is a nice cave with all kinds of interesting features going from slot canyon passage to river passage with large rooms and other interesting features.

Salts Cave, Indiana

We entered the cave and checked out some side passages until we went to the left and found our selves at the top of a downclimb that we had to traverse down and around to get to the bottom.

Upper passage Salts Cave, Indiana

We worked our way down and found a talus slope to climb up which was slippery and muddy to get to the top.

Salts Cave, Indiana

Once we got to the top we followed some side passages until they ended and traversed back to the slot canyon passage down in the main river conduit.

Salts Cave, Indiana

We work our way through the slot canyon and crawl around in the cave water which I found an interesting side passage that took me back around into where we were sitting around.

Salts Cave, Indiana

The passage continued so we followed the large walking passage until it came to a sump that was not passable.

Laura helps me light up Salts Cave

The sump itself does not seem to be a divable passage

Salts Cave, Indiana

After we left this section we headed for the cold exit that awaited us which included a run across the field and a quick car change

Disco Bat in Salts Cave, Indiana

I highly recommend this cave for anyone who wants to enjoy some caving fun in a interesting and challenging cave.

Salts Cave, Indiana

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SULLIVAN CAVE

January 05, 2013

Sullivan Cave, Indiana

It was great to get everyone together for a trip to Sullivan cave and after talking with Windy City Grotto, we got around 13 people together for the trip into the cave.

Sullivan Cave, Indiana

It was a bitter cold day with some snow in the forecast but nothing we thought would create a flood which changed a bit once we got into the cave.

Sullivan Cave, Indiana

We entered the cave and continued down some canyon like passages and missed the back breaker passage which took us to the lower sections maze canyon and through the bowls of the cave. we went left and right but ended up getting a bit mis oriented and had to stop a few times to find our way around.

Sullivan Cave, Indiana

Finally we worked out way up into the back breaker passage and continued down until we got the corridor that took us to the merry go round room.

Sullivan Cave, Indiana

The cave opens up into walking passage and we took a tour of the merry go round room and continued to find the mountain room which was through a hole in the ground and into a fairly large room.

Sullivan Cave, Indiana

This was quite impressive and we took some photos here while enjoying the cave a bit more before going into the river passages.

Sullivan Cave, Indiana

We worked our way down into the lower river passages which consist of some large river passage which had some raging white water passing through.

Sullivan Cave, Indiana

We noticed that the water levels went up a bit when we were down in the river passage so we decided to turn around and head back out.

Sullivan Cave, Indiana

we all made it out safe with no incident and it was a fantastic day in Sullivan cave.

Sullivan Cave, Indiana

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COLDWATER CAVE DOWN RIVER

December 10, 2012

Coldwater Cave Iowa

This is my second time visiting Coldwater cave and after the first time in the cavge, I was itching to come back and visit the downstream passages that this cave had to offer. Mark Jones and Mike Lace accompanied us on this wonderful trip down river to the sump which was quite fun and quite, well....COLD!!!

Coldwater Cave Iowa

Even in a full 7mm Wetsuit from head to toe, the water got quite cold after being in this cave for over 8 hours. We started off with a lot of walking passage past Big Bertha and other amazign formations until we got to the first swim.

Coldwater Cave Iowa

The Water was quite clear but it was indeed a swim and in 48 degree water with a 48 degree cave, it was quite the ball chiller!!!

Coldwater Cave Iowa

Afterwards we continued on passed some interesting watercut formations until we got to a waterfall side passage. I believe this leads to another waterfall hours up this passage which can make for an over 12 hour trip in coldwater cave.

Coldwater Cave Iowa

We continued on past a few more breakdown rooms and past another cold chilling swim until the passages started to get a little deeper and smaller. They were still walking passage which was nice.

Coldwater Cave Iowa

We stopped right before the sump and went up a side passage that had some solid rimstone dams and watercrawling passage that would lead us to a dome room.

Coldwater Cave Iowa

We checked out another side lead that took us to a interesting raining dome room and another climb up that had rusted formations which might have been from iron deposits oxidizing in the moisture.

Coldwater Cave Iowa

Once we left this passage we decided to start our way out of the cave so we walked upstream to the vertical entrance culvert which is around 100ft to the surface.

48 Degree water in Coldwater Cave Iowa

We finally got out of the cave and were told that sometimes this cave can have radon levels so high that it is like working in a uranium mine for a day...great, im glad I know that now...!!

Oxidizing formation in Coldwater Cave Iowa

Regardless, We had a fantastic day in a beautiful cave and I was happy to return to coldwater after a year of waiting to visit this beautiful place.

Waterfall in Coldwater Cave Iowa

Flowstone hallway Coldwater Cave Iowa

Coldwater Cave Iowa

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WAYNES CAVE

November 24, 2012

Wayne's Cave

I have heard about Wayne's Cave being a interesting place to checkout with its infamous 1/4 mile crawl and miles of cave passge beyond the army crawl section. Waynes cave is located in Bloomington Indiana and we were able to get access to visit this day on a cold sunday morning. We didnt want to spend too much time as we had to get back to chicago that night and some others had to get back to Iowa. We all met up in bloomington and set out for the property in a convoy of cars upto the gate. We parked and geared up to enter waynes cave which had a gated entrance.

Right at the beginning of the crawl, Wayne's Cave

We took a before shot before we entered the cave and rigged a handline in case we needed it to get over the steep entrance. We all made it down and found the start to the crawl where we got down on our bellies and pushed our way through the army crawl passage.

Wayne's Cave before we enter

Entrance to Wayne's Cave

Our clothes were ripping apart and the clunkling sound of knee and elbo pads could be heard echoing down this small crawl. There were spots where we were able to take breaks by sitting up a bit but there was not much room for that. Eventually, we made it to a slot canyon passage that continued to get deeper until it became a dry fall and the exit to the main trunk passage of Wayne's Cave

Wayne's Cave passage

The passage was maninly a canyon like passage that was interesting to traverse and had some exposure to it. We followed a merry go round room and came back to where we started at the exposed climbdown trunk passage. We continued to follow the trunk passage down and made it to a section where we had to climb up and traverse over a exposed slippery slope. We rigged some more webbing for this section for safety. We continue on into some bigger rooms and pass camp one and camp2

Wayne's Cave passage

We made it to camp three and decided to take a break here to chill a bit and get our bearings as to how far we got in the cave and what time we had left to either keep going or start turning back. We decided that we should start turning back due to the limited about of time that we had so we made our traverse out of the cave in good time.

Liz davis and others in the crawl passage taking a break Wayne's Cave

Going through the crawl we lost almost half of our group so coming back out was a little faster than going in but we all had a blast and were glad we spent a day in Wayne's Cave.