Yucatan Cave Diving-Mexico

maddiver

Trip Report-Yucatan Cave Diving ***Disclaimer/Intro: For those who are interested I have posted my trip report to Akumal area from the week before. Originally this was posted to the California BBS at diver.net but in light of the training and interest stirred up concerning Mexico I figured it may be a source of entertainment. Most likely it is awash in punctuation, spelling and grammatical errors as it was written very late so you are forewarned. Also did I mention it is really long? You may see references to 'Daryl's Video' or 'Cave Diving the Yucatan Peninsula' which is the feature length video put out this past fall by Sub Aqua Productions (which if you would like to see the images or download a 3min trailer just go to http://www.subaquaproductions.com, also I'm sure Daryl wouldn't mind if you bought the DVD or VHS either). Akumal/Tulum Trip Report- Very, Very Long Overview: 3 Dive Days 9 Dives 5 using DPVs 4 Utilizing Nitrox Caves: Naharon (Cenote Cristal), Calimba (Sak Aktun), Dos Ojos, Tortuga, Vaca Ha Equipment: Alum 80 doubles & Stages, EE pro 14 with 18watt HID, Mako DPVs, one ugly crushed to the max 6.5 mm wetsuit with hooded vest (currently taking donations via paypal, ScubaPro mk20s, 15s-G250’s (15’s on bg, 20’s on stages). Base: Hotel El Meson/Aktun Dive Center-Tulum Cave Vehicle: Chevy Pop (stop laughing, it’s a great cave car!) with no ac and insurance of course for where we were taking it. Trip goals: 1) Fun 2) Avoiding Montezuma’s Revenge 3) Avoiding a trip to the doctor for prescription ear medication to kill the ear rot you get from ‘Vaca Ha’ – cow water 4) Recover Daryl’s ‘Hero Arrow’ at the base of the ladder at Vaca Ha 5) Cause additional line arrow controversy but replacing Aquatech Arrows with Superheroes Arrows (i.e. batman, robin, wonder woman, superman, and incredible hulk). The Long Stuff: After an hour of sitting on the runway in Houston (we were number 36 in line after a big storm had passed) my buddy was getting anxious. I reminded him that since we weren’t doing the ‘guide thing’ it didn’t really matter what time we arrived, as I am that loco gringo who likes to go cave diving at 2am anyway. Flight was smooth and we planned out our dives and outlined expectations and limitations on the plane (Steve Gerrard’s book is a great tool for even the most veteran of Yucatan divers). We zipped though immigration and I was a little apprehensive at customs since I was carrying Daryl’s stash (25 cave diving videos) and was trying to formulate a last minute response to unclaimed commercial merchandise. Green light, no explanation today. Avis preferred does you no good in Mexico. We got our Chevy pop hatch back and checked for our full sized doughnut spare tire (important as a flat tire is inevitable somewhere in Mexico + they like to charge you when you return if there wasn’t one in there in the first place). We purchased insurance as I got hosed last year when Daryl and I were making the video and got a small ‘ding’ that they called a $700 dent. Dealing with the Credit Card insurance wasn’t worth the 18.99 a day for insurance so we opted for coverage (as long as we brought them the steering wheel and license plate we were good to go). On the road, I took driving lessons from Daryl’s wife, Jamie, last year (also the best looking cave diver in that video “Cave Diving The Yucatan Peninsula”) and put the pedal to the metal on the Pop doing 140 km leaving us in Tulum in ~1hr 10min (had to slow for the lack of visibility in a few spots where locals were burning tires and the dumb tourists who don’t know the Mexican highway rules. This btw is the most dangerous part of the trip, the drive. Arrive onsite at Aktun Dive Center run by German, Gunnar Wagner. He teases me about being a goooie (GUE) diver and DIRist all in fun as I comment on his less than usual Star Wars Bar Scene that is usually going on with all the European Cavers. Gunnar is one great guy no matter what gear he uses and his National Geographic Articles and the 50,000 ft of cave he has explored last year is nothing to shake a stick at either. I drop off some of the ‘contraband videos’ and we shove off for Calimba after assembling our gear with a small crowd observing, pointing, and commenting in German (my what it feels like to be in the minority of gear configuration again). Calimba is about to become a victim of the inevitable growing Mexican tourist economy, with a snack shop, bathrooms and changing facilities being erected. Sad. We gear up and dive in for a warm up stage dive, taking it slow and easy. If you have been in Calimba or Sak Aktun you know that you could spend a whole dive in any 500ft passage and be visually overwhelmed by the formations (I mean I get out of dives tried and drained from euphoric visual stimulation…and no its not narcosis at 40 ft). Daryl’s video captures a lot of this. It’s a relatively small cave (single file passage) 20 to 40 ft in depth that has many tight turns and a few vertical walls that you have to negotiate. Restrictions are several and challenging due to the delicate nature of the stalactites which are milky white in color. The floor is covered deep in this fine white silt formed from many years of stalactite erosion and other processes that I am not scientifically party to (my ignorance shows). The silty or more rightly particulate is not like fine clay that stays in suspension for days, it is a little heavier allowing for most to settle out in 10 minutes with a foggy effect lingering for several hours. So don’t kick it up. I found a survey slate (nice one) near the end of a line between Lithium Sunset section and Azteca. I led in with my buddy bringing up the rear, when we turned I could see his rig looked a bit unbalanced. It appeared that the right side harness was an inch and a half too long and this was causing air trapping in the right side of his wing leading to trim and form issues. On the way out I noticed how his spools would benefit from placement on a rear D-ring as they continued to give him trouble catching the line and caused extra task loading when checking the pressure in his doubles and also on the manipulation of the stage bottle. Also we discussed fin kicks as most cavers are accustom to using the ‘frog kick’ as an efficient means of travel, but in my opinion unless modified, is a poor single choice for the longevity and beauty of this particular system. Taking the time to change these items as well as keeping in mind a shorter HP hose for his SPG on the next trip greatly increased his efficiency on later dives and kept the cave happy and beautiful. All I asked is that he tried my suggestions on one dive and if it made no difference then he could go back to his old ways. Our dive was a refreshing 159min. The next dive found us modifying the Makos for use with appropriate leash/tow cords (for some reason hydrodynamics hasn’t made it to Mexico yet or maybe they just like the prop wash directed at the groin area??). I got the crappy mako with a broken right handle and a battery that was installed incorrectly (that we were unable to alter since they were not our scooters) and I gave my buddy the good one since he had only a dozen scooter dives. Dos Ojos was our destination and you should see the little Chevy Pop loaded down with two sets of doubles, stages, and two DPV’s and by now stinkin’ wetsuits. The lines have been changed in Dos Ojos since I was there before (no more of this garbage with on line going under another one by 12 inches) they were now jumps/gaps. Dos Ojos for those that haven’t had the pleasure was once the second largest until Ox Bel Ha jumped both Dos Ojos and Nahoch Nachich for number one. Still at over 200,000 + ft of line, you can dive a long time and not see it all. Most of our dive was really shallow 25 ft or less but Dos Ojos has a max depth over 355’ in ‘the Pit’. You may be wondering why I haven’t mentioned my buddy’s name by now (and no it wasn’t Daryl as that Joker only does 3 week trips and I ruined his canister light the weekend before at Coronados so I am persona non grata) and I choose to keep it confidential due to the ‘learning experiences’ we happened onto during this trip. As I mentioned we planned out our dives and reviewed emergency procedures for each type of diving we were doing. The first learning experience came when we were in Dos Ojos with the hammer down on the Makos and he was leading. He blew right over a gap and kept going full tilt boogie. I immediately came off the trigger flared to stop me and pulled a spool while signaling him to stop. He didn’t respond and I know that had the level of attention that I expect been present he would have seen my signal (I had an HID and he had Halogen and I could make out his shadow on the wall as my light signaled back and forth). So I quickly made the gap with the spool and turned my scooter up and hit the trigger. Lucky I am more streamlined and had a little advantage of speed to catch up (took me two minutes) to get to an acceptable distance and to get him to stop. Out came the wet notes and one word ‘AWARENESS!’ was communicated He signaled ok, and I pointed again to be sure, then wrote about the gap and that I dropped a spool as we had agreed not to do visual gaps; He signaled ok. On again we were on our way, I leaving my scooter turned up and now scootering in tight beside him (keeping one eye on the line). Each jump/gap/change of line arrows etc I would signal ok around it with a circle of the light until I got a response indicating he saw it. Dos Ojos is a spider web of lines with areas where line arrows point counter to where you came from and also two arrows point in different directions (the only choice in my mind is to mark your path and have a continuous guideline to the surface (exit). We surfaced in an air pocket to discuss that we were nearing the limit of my comfort level with these scooters burn time and I was ready to think about turning the dive in the next five minutes and that on the way out he would lead also due to the HID vs Halogen issue. We scooter on and pop out near our stage bottles (we could see them across a jump from the line we were on. My buddy wanted to just pick them up and go out but I disagreed as it would require doing a visual (which we had planned not to do and also he forgot that I put in another spool that I wasn’t about to give up). We scootered back to the air pocket where we surfaced and I needed to readjust my light. I told him, “Lets head out from here with you leading after I fix my light”. He said ok then disappeared. I put the final touches on my light and got on the trigger out. Immediately in the first 50 ft I sensed something wrong. No silt, no perculation, no light in front of me (I could see for a long distance it was straight cave at this point) I covered my light no indication. So I headed right back to the air dome where we last saw one another. 3 min later he came up and asked what was wrong. I said ‘You were going the wrong way’. He says “well you said go out” and I reminded him of our prior agreement about visuals and my spool not to mention I said I had to fix my light. I asked about the awareness of my light and he said that he couldn’t make it out it was not bright enough and I said it was because I was never behind him! Then he asks if I can put this test tube he ‘found’ in my pocket and hands me an unbroken test tube. Rather odd for a cave to have an unbroken test tube I thought as my buddy went past me in the correct direction this time. I followed and a minute later his light went out (it was his test tube that came off). What a cluster and all I could do was laugh at this point. I laugh not because it was a joke, but just that this was a very good learning experience for my friend (and I remember all to fondly being there) and one that I knew he would make it out of. I contemplated giving him an out of air signal and making him donate the long hose and match scooter speeds on the way out but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. We picked up the bottles and I saw those ‘big eyes’ as he fumbled with the bottle so I slung the light head over my shoulder and whipped out the wet notes and told him that he now had a stage bottle with loads of gas, a functioning scooter, another back up light and 3 light sources on me…….oh and that he owed me a new set of wet notes as I used all 100 pages up on this dive. He finally saw the humor with the smiley face at the end and realized that I was perfectly calm and that we had loads of gas. At no time was I complacent about our situation, as I watched him put on his stage bottle ready to donate air if he fumbled it too bad as well as noting time, distance, and air considerations. We exited safely with no additional Charlie Foxtrots. Mr. Murphy would have to wait at least until tomorrow. One of the reasons I enjoy Mexico so much is the people and personalities. Buddy Quattlebaum, owner of Hidden Worlds and the founder of Dos Ojos Dive Center is one of my favorite characters and I spent two hours listening to fun filled subjects like his homemade closed circuit rebreather that he makes out of truck innertubes, pvc, brass fittings all for under $500usd! He has taken this thing to 360 in Dos Ojos….he really is a ‘Tough Guy’. He also gave me a preview of the A&E special that Kane was involved in and gave me a run down of where they went and what their activities were. He has some of the footage from Wes Skiles and may put some A&E doesn’t decide to use on his website well before the Special airs. He said there was some great cave and that Wes got some great shots. He said to ask Kane when the A&E special would come out cause he didn’t know. He also got a delivery of product from Daryl via Daryl’s carrier pigeon (me). We dove Calimba again next. I can never get enough of this cave, in need my fix and between this dive and the one the next day we put in 561 ft of line (measured by the amount of line started with on reels subtracting that which was left afterwards). All my buddies think I have some rabid obsession for this cave…well its true. Next came Vaca Ha at night where we got in that nasty water with scooters and stages (why we took stages I will never know ; ) Vaca Ha was owned by Don Camilo a nice little guy that no one could understand who fell in Tortuga and died recently. He really liked divers and liked it when you brought him a coke when you dove, so much that he showed you his pet Tarantula (he let it crawl all over him and he would pet it- icky). We entered the surface pool in the dark and put stages and scooters on and then my buddy’s bolt snap to his light (non essential equipment) busted. So he gets out rather than slinging the light over his head when not in his hand and puts a zip tie on it all the while I am waiting in the cow water praying shit is not getting in my ears (I have yet to get back from this area without a massive ear infection) . He puts one on and gets back in busting that zip tie again. He insists on getting out and I am extremely irritated at this point and consider calling the dive instead of floating around in the ‘cow water’ for another 40 mins. Anyway we get started and it is great sized cave to scooter. Vaca Ha is a deeper cave averaging ~55ft with max on our dive in the 70’s. If you are on air consider Nitrox or be prepared to deco. My buddy didn’t have a good grasp on depth averaging and didn’t feel comfortable to running my schedule so I suffered a ridiculous deco (as I cannot leave my buddy at deco in fear that Daryl’s Hero Arrow might attack him). Vaca Ha is darker cave with deep tan to dark brown areas and some almost black with large columns that run 40 ft + floor to ceiling and 10 ft thick. Rooms can be up to 100 ft wide at places. The visibility was somewhat reduced here even with a HID maybe 65-70 max. I like to scooter upside down in this cave and do aerolon rolls and screw with my buddy blasting them with prop wash running into them and causing all sorts of havoc. The shots in Daryl’s video came from this cave and Tortuga for many of the scooter scenes. The next morning we were mixed for Naharon or so I thought. We requested 36% and we got one 32.6 and one 33.4 in doubles and 36.8 in stage and 37.9 in other stage. Hmmmm modified tables for sure. Or plan was to do a huge dive using scooters and stages and nitrox to maximize our efforts with max depth being around 75ft and planned BT being between 150-180 with any resulting deco added upon exit. Mr. Murphy awoke early this morning. First I didn’t like the tank issue with doubles of nitrox only available in non-isolator style scubapro manifolds. I take issue with inability to isolate tanks. Second I didn’t like the perceived ‘complexity’ that my buddy would feel with different mixes. We talked through some schedules and discussed some points he wasn’t to clear on and calculated EADs for both mixes from which he could depth average when accounting for time on each gas and relate back to his air tables in his pocket since he didn’t like the deco planner tables I printed out. I told him this was a dark cave and he knew this but that the ceiling is funny and that columns and stalactites will come out of nowhere on you so he should ride a little lower an stay by the line as he had less scooter experience. Well into the dive after the stage drop he encountered problems and indicated he was getting dizzy due to his ear and was uncomfortable and we turned the dive. I was right behind him until we hit the stages and I grabbed mine and was securing it while watching him and he lost control and went to the ceiling so I went after him pulling him out of some nasty looking stalactites, he seemed shaken and dropped his bottle and started scootering out. I signaled him to wait (I hadn’t switched to my stage, it was on but I wasn’t breathing it and I wanted him to come back and get on his stage, there was a long way to go and I wanted extra gas on both our backs). I ripped the dial to nine on the scooter and nailed it heading for the floor, sweeping down I grabbed his bottle not letting off the trigger and attempted to quickly clip it off to my side d-Ring in the other bottle’s slipstream. I did this while turning left around a blind corner and got caught taking a quick peak back and at that moment Murphy struck or should I say a very dark black rock decided it would come between the bottle I was messing with and my left forearm. I nailed it at full speed and I immediately prayed that I had not broken my arm (boy that would have been embarrassing). There was no obvious sign that it was broken and it wasn’t just really bruised and at the time I had limited use of the left hand. Immediately I used my right hand to pull out my stage reg out of the innertube on the stage and twist the knob open. I was now on my stage. Now it was really important I catch up to my buddy so I am scootering again hoping he looks back. My thoughts turned to the fact that now he was a good distance ahead of me with non-isolator tanks and essentially solo with major anxiety issues coupled with possible physical problems that could lead to disorientation and misdirection. I scootered for 3mins which seemed like forever and my scooter began to slow (great what a time for this…we later learned that at some point during the last charge the charger went bad). So I turned it down two clicks and went 2 more minutes and found my buddy who had busted off his right knob on the ceiling just seconds before. There was no gas loss, no regulator damage, just a valve sheer. Nevertheless, I made him take his stage back. Well we made it out but I was pissed at myself for hitting that rock because I didn’t take the extra five seconds to secure his stage before scootering around an object in a tight area. We also discussed that he concentrate on awareness and situation management through smaller dives, coupled with shelving the dpv for awhile. My left hand regained its use (I think I just hit a nerve). Yucatan continued: At this point many are wondering what is the deal with my dive buddy. I was wondering the same thing, as he had never exhibited this type of behavior or lack of execution on any dive much less so many. I would later learn that he was focused on things other than cave diving. Our trip was unwinding and we had two more dives planned which we revised the dive plans for given the experiences of the past two days. Like I mentioned this is someone who I had been diving with before and he had a fair number of cave dives (~100) enough to be beyond this type of performance. I believe in giving people chances and that some have off days but this was getting bad, for me as well as him. Its not that I couldn't handle the individual problems that occurred but my cave training and more importantly my experience leads me to believe you should nip problems in the bud before they occur rather than be forced to manage them. There could come a point where a combination of factors was beyond my control. And I started to approach the dives as if I were solo diving or worse that my buddy could become a liability needing an inordinate amount of gas or leaving me to my own devices in a serious situation. I fought internally with several issues including the suggestion that he become re-orientated through remedial training by a gue cave instructor. Also he should re-evaluate if cave diving was for him at this point in his life or at all in the future. As Harry Averal says "Cave Diving is not for Everyone". I am not a cave instructor nor do I want to be. I cave dive for me and historically have had a select group of buddies who know my every move as I know theirs. The moment I stop enjoying cave diving I am done. Back to the diving: Calimba: Curtailed Dive Plan to check out this 'hole' in the floor on the Calimba circuit. Short dive if you just do it without stopping about 1250-1500 max penetration. But I had a lot of stuff I wanted to check out. My focus on this dive was to carry my stage bottle with me wherever I went (where practical of course). So we set out checking some stuff out along the sides and adding line to some areas I had marked the day before. We got to the hard 90 to the left and I took the jump and continued for ~350 ft to where the floor has 3 distinct holes that drop from 40 to ?. Most of this system is less than 45 ft and the possibility of a 'lower level' of cave was real especially if I hit the saltwater layer. The third hole was the largest of the three but still really small. I took off the stage and got on the BG for the first time in the dive and tied off my spool and dropped feet first down the shaft until my waist where the canister light and doubles prevented my further progress at this angle. I shifted around where I could just barely squeeze down (I realized that coming back I may have to shoot through this hole as exact as I had positioned to come down and therefore needed to allow extra egress time). I burst into a fair size room with lower level that contained saltwater the beautiful blue clear kind reminiscent of the Temple of Doom type. Salt water started at about 52-55 ft and the room's lower section went to 70 ft deep (the deepest section in Sac Aktun to my knowledge or on any known map). I was excited but perculation from the ceiling was making things really hard to see and my buddy was not going to come through that hole……his hips were too wide. I quickly checked all potential for leads and they looked like dead ends so I came back through that hole. It took about 1min 45sec to extract myself and this started to concern my buddy since I just didn't slide out and it appeared that I was stuck on several occasions. I extracted myself and got back on my stage (I was going to breath my stage the whole dive and preserve BG as full as possible). Runtime of 107min. Max depth 70 with avg depth 40. Tortuga: This was the last dive and as such I felt like we had finally shaken Mr. Murphy from our previous dives. We were gassed up with 36% in doubles and had fresh charges on the DPV's. We elected not to use stages in this cave and just to have fun speeding around. Tortuga is located on the same property as Vaca Ha only much further into the jungle (about 10min drive on a two track sascab road). It was dark and we quickly suited up avoiding the mosquitoes (yep there were lots of those damn things at night). I placed the DPVs in the water looking for signs of the 2ft Cayman that Steve Gerard had been feeding ground beef to. It looks like a little crocodile. I didn't see him which made me feel worse than if I could keep an eye on him since he now associates food with people and Kate (Steve's wife) refuses to bring the dog like she used to when visiting this cenote. The basin was clear which only happens in the winter at Tortuga but was quickly zeroed out due to the plant material at the bottom. My buddy left an extra safety light on the edge of the cenote turned off for our return to aid in climbing out. (This 'disappeared'-read was stolen by the time we returned. Kind of spooky way out in the jungle if you ask me). Tortuga is another deepish cave for Mexico with depths of 70ish not uncommon necessitating more attention to air management and use of nitrox or monitoring/planning of deco times. We hit this cave hard, scootering full blast down the mainline through large rooms with huge columns and stalactites and stalagmites and columns that were brown to darkish red/black in color. As we passed 500 ft we went deep into the salt layer to the left on a jump and took a left turn scootered until the line ended and returned to the main line. We then proceeded to 1000 ft up the mainline and took the left T which sent us into a smaller section testing our scootering skills in a semi-delicate section. This section is characterized by vertical depth variations ending with an ascent into a tannic filled dome at 25ft. U-turn here back to take the right T. Scootered through large bore like tunnel that was fairly straight at 60ish depth with my buddies prop wash emitting a surreal trail much like the heat dissipating from a jet turbine on an aircraft (this was due to the salt lens/fresh water mixing). Pretty cool contrail. We came to a break down with clay that lead up to 20ish feet but pushing the scooters through this smallish area churned up billowing clouds of silt. My buddy became unnerved at this point and signaled to turn around. I whipped out my wet notes to tell him we needed to continue on swimming only for five minutes to give that slit a chance to disperse before attempting to go through it. He refused and began the return with me begrudgingly in tow. It got so bad that we were unable to maintain contact and before I knew it I was tumbling over backwards with the line pulled from my hand by my scooter which had been activated by the leash (the owner refuses to allow us to pin the trigger). This was a huge cluster and my immediate need was to regain the line. Somehow the double ender in the my pocket with my car keys on it became tangled in a mat of the line and I could only see a faint glow from my HID when placed toward my mask…it was zeroed out. The scooter wasn't making things any better so I unclipped it and tied it below me (my head is angled down at this point with my feet above me and the line caught around me on my keys and double ender). My buddy was gone and I just had to laugh and actually said that this has to be a joke as I haven't had this many things go wrong in the last 450 cave dives. I had plenty of gas and my focus surrounded extracting myself without losing my keys. As the prospect of walking out of the jungle at midnight to try and find someone who could make another key so you could leave by 5am to make your flight somehow didn't seem real appealing. I unlatched the keys and attached them to my back up light clip, then proceeded to undo the double ender which extracted me from the line. Out of that mess I quickly stowed my keys back on the double ender in my pocket and made my way slowly through the silt. At the bottom I came into clear water and looked down the straight tunnel for my buddy. He wasn't there and this was cause for alarm as I wondered if he too had lost the line. I waited holding my breath and listening, punctuated by screaming through my reg lots of expletives in hopes of a reply…none. Just about his time here came a light at the end of that long tunnel. He had scootered out to the T on me, 600 ft and waited five minutes before returning. We hit the exit without any further incidents although this pretty much convinced me never to dive with him again, personal problem or not…you don't leave your buddy. WE piled the doubles in the car turned on the car's defrost for the windows and started the engine to ensure lights and sufficient battery power and then I went to pick up the scooters. The ladder at Tortuga is really slimy and tilts to the right. I slipped back and fell into the water backwards with my foot catching up above on a rung and placing me paddling with my arms to stay afloat. Of course I was yelling for my buddy at this point who was sitting in the car with the vent turned way up to keep mosquitoes off and supposedly couldn't hear me. He finally came down and extracted my foot. My wetsuit had aided in my buoyancy but I was shaken buy this experience. Some major lessons: I don't care how good you think you are when this much goes wrong hang it up for the trip and visit some ruins, go to Carlos and Charlie's, but whatever you do stay out of the water. But I guess I'm still young dumb and full of hot water. All in all it was still fun and I got my diving fix, but at what potential price? I should wait until my friends Daryl and Jamie can go cave diving with me so as I never have to worry about any of that garbage taking place. Yeah Daryl this is all your fault, I think you need to take me cave diving ; ) comments/questions/concerns/flames/$ contributions welcome