Florida CCR Cave trip Panhandle, N. Central, Eagles Nest Nov. 1-5

[deep thought]

Florida CCR Cave Trip Nov 1 – 5

I just returned from Florida where I spent 5 days visiting some caves I haven’t done before, and re-visiting a couple old favorites.

The first three days were spent at Marianna, which is located in the Panhandle (north of Panama City, west of Tallahassee on 10), and home to Merritt’s Mill Pond.  The pond is a gator swamp that is man made dammed reservoir about 200 yards wide by 5 miles long.  In the pond is: Jackson Blue, Twin Cave, Hole in Wall and a number of side mount caves I did not visit.  My first dive was at Jackson, a very popular cave which pumps out more fresh water daily than Devils system at Ginny park (reference is that Devils system is high flow and can really whoop butt), and most divers would dive the system with a scooter.  We got lucky and the flow was lower than normal, good thing as we did not have scooters.  Jackson is also popular as you can do this dive from shore entry at the popular swim beach, and all the other caves in the pond are boat dives.  Jackson is a nice white wall cave, with a big cavern entrance, lots of big and small passages, and about 5000 feet of line laid (we did about 1400 ft.).  Our next dive was at Twin Cave, which is a bit tricky to see as the cave does not get as much traffic and the weeds almost totally obscure the two openings.  The landmark is a dock built in the cypress trees by the cave community, and the cave entrance is only a few yards away.  The cave is named for the two entrance holes side by side, with the main entry a bit of a squeeze but opens into a nice cavern before you swim down the main passage to the Subway Tunnel.  This cave is low to no flow so proper buoyancy is critical to avoid silt out.  There is a nice drop down from 60’ to about 100’ that makes a nice circuit.  Nice passages, although not as white as Jackson…I did appreciate the low flow and neat cracks and crevices this system offered.  The last dive in Merritt’s was at Hole in The Wall, also located by the divers dock in trees or located just below the dry cave entrance.  This also starts out as a tight squeeze to enter, but then opens up into a nice cavern with a drop down chimney to about 80 feet, then two main passages upstream / downstream.  This is also a low to no flow system, easy to dive with proper buoyancy and the really neat features are toward the ceiling anyhow.  You will see lots of domes and structure, lots of Swiss cheese holes in walls, some nice large passages and lots of fossils in walls.  You can also see the albino crayfish and salamanders.  All of these dives were done off of Edds pontoon boat that we rented from Cave Adventurers, located right on the Mill Pond.  Great shop, with excellent customer service and the rental rates for the pontoons are only $70 per day and can easily accommodate 6 divers comfortably.
 
Madison Blue was the next destination, and closer to the High Springs / Live Oak area but for some reason I never made the jump.  The cave is located in a state park, which regulates only 3 teams dive the system at a time…perhaps a limitation that deterred us in past.  It is a first magnitude spring that boils out of the limestone from the 82-foot clear blue spring pool.  The large cavern entrance has a drop down to about 80 feet and nice passages, with several side passages.  From large to smaller tunnels, it is a fun cave with lots of challenges. 
Little River was an old favorite and this time it was not about to disappoint, with lower flow than normal.  I really enjoy the zigzag entrance with its entire maze of rooms before you get to the Merry Go Round and Florida Room.  We went to the Well Pipe, which is a nice swim, but at a 100 foot depth the 60-minute swim to the pipe adds up the deco time.  Since the flow was low the visibility was also down to 40 foot, but we were fortunate to be the only divers in the system and the low ceiling silty tunnels to the well pipe were undisturbed.

The last dive on this trip was to Eagles Nest, which is located between Crystal River and Weeki Wachee in the Chassahowitzka wildlife refuge.  Unfortunately just the day before we planned to dive the cave, two divers who lacked the proper training had an accident and one of them drown.  Getting to Eagles Nest is an adventure in itself as the only access to the site is nine miles north and requires that you drive 30-40 minutes through winding dirt roads which just happen to run parallel to highway, and past a closed access near the site.  But once you are at the small pond that has the cave entrance located in about middle, you are in the middle of nowhere with a small parking area, a couple of tables, a sign and a nice diver access built by the cave community.  It’s hot, and jungle growth, tall trees but no shade surround you where you need it.   The pond is typical with blankets of green algae on the surface, but once you are under the canopy the water is quite clear.  The entrance to Eagles Nest looks like a crack with a couple round holes in the bottom, and one of the holes has a stout line attached to the entry which drops down to a breakdown mound at about 130 feet where the main gold line marks Upstream / Downstream.   It is a neat vertical hole around 8 foot in diameter that starts around 40’ish foot in the pond to about 70 foot at top of cavern dome room.   Now these Up/Down directions are more cursory than direction of water flow, as there is negligible flow in this giant system.  The cavern room is enormous and swallows even the brightest dive light.  We chose the upstream passage as it has a larger opening from the main cavern room.  As you drop down from the mound you are around 180 still slanting towards the 280’ish depth of the passage.  It’s a big, wide, tall tunnel with only a few offshoots.  Deco stacks up quickly on this dive, so swim pace needs to be efficient.   Visibility on the day I dived EN was around 40-50 and it may be due to the accident and recovery.  The dive was a very neat experience, and a cave I hope to explore again soon.

Of course the entire trip was powered by CCR with my choice a rEvo and my dive buddy diving a Classic Inspiration.  All of these dives were hours long, with most in the 100 foot range, and the deepest being Eagles Nest at 280+.  This trip consumed only 3 sets of diluent/oxygen cylinders (20 cu. ft.) and less than one pail of dive sorb! Its nice to not be rushed or concerned about swim pace when you have a CCR, just plan for enough bail out in low flow and take your time.

I’m looking forward to returning to Florida for at least one more cave trip, then a couple trips specifically to train rEvo CCR divers, and an instructor level training week.

Good Diving

Ron