Post by Mike Green on Feb 13, 2007 16:55:36 GMT -5
The Historic Pulldown
February 10, 2007
Matt Ketron, Matt Shohl, and I (Mike Green) drove to Dorton Knob on a sunny, Saturday afternoon. The three of us had previously planned that we would travel through the historical, Gnat Hole Entrance of the Dorton Knob Smoke Hole and out the Yuppie Boating Entrance in efforts to retrieve vast amounts of gear including pre-rigged ropes. Before entry, we had anticipated moving a large rock previously wedged into the already small, three-foot diameter entrance, but upon arrival, we realized that Chad and other members of the Yuppie Team had already removed it. Thanks guys!
I got on rope and began to slide down into the 30’ entrance drop, but like the rock before me, I became hopelessly stuck. After much squirming and a little help from Ketron, I got back out into the open. Bewildered, I stared down at my belly and questioned having gained too much weight to go back into the tight crawlways of the Dorton Knob Smoke Hole. It was not until we kicked down lose sediment that we noticed a stump lodged in the entrance. This “stump” turned out to be the bottom of a twenty-foot log! After this discovery, we finished knocking down the log and proceeded to rappel the 30’er. Standing at the bottom of the drop, memories of times long past began to erupt in the distant recesses of my mind. It had been almost two years since I had last stood in this very spot, and I wondered if this section of the Smoke Hole would be as daunting now as it had then. At least on this trip, we would not have to suffer through the nightmares of the Historical Entrance twice, for to our knowledge, we would be performing the first Historic Pulldown.
By the time Ketron and Schohl had rappelled the Gnat Hole, I had already free-climbed Jave’s Climb which is a tricky 15’ climbup proceeded by a 20’ pit. I rigged this barrier to enable an efficient way to pass off our gear, and of course, to help make the trip a little easier for my compatriots. After passing gear up on one side and down the other, we proceeded into the Horror Crawl.
The passage dubbed the Horror Crawl is just as nasty as I last recalled! The dimensions do not exceed a foot or two, and continues for approximately 150’. This must all be done as a belly crawl because there is no opportunity to sit up, turn around, or even to look backwards! However, the true challenge of the crawl comes from the narrow canyon that runs parallel to our place of agony. If one is to slide too far down into the canyon, energy must be expelled in order to pull oneself back up into traversable passage. As we literally inched our ways through this misery, I periodically passed buttons that had belong to a friend, Brian Gindling’s old cotton suit. I laughed as I thought of all those times we had entered and exited through this very crawlway with cheap and ineffective cotton suits. Of course now we would not ever dream of wearing such a thing in the Smoke Hole, but this was from an early era of our development as cavers. In addition to seeing remnants of our suits, I could spot knee pads, carabineers, gloves, and all sorts of other gear tragically and hopelessly lost in the depths of the Smoke Hole. After only thirty minutes or so, I was relieved to be standing at the top of the first, in-cave pit (33’). After we had all rappelled this pit, I learned that this would be the first pulldown trip for both Ketron and Shohl. I could only image what it must have felt like for the two as they, for the first time, pulled down our ropes, and therefore stranding us in the cave. At this point, we were no longer able to go back out the way we had traveled, thus invoking a most anxious and uncomfortable feeling.
Following a hundred feet of hands and knees crawling, we were at the second pit (45’). From here, there is a tricky climbup and climbdown which leads to a room where we caught back up to the water; however, we quickly lost sight of the water again as we entered a 1000’ dry, overfollow, hands alcove that is mostly hands and knees crawling. The crawl ends at the next and final pit in the Historical Entrance (44’), but I had one last objective to commence: retrieving my rack that had fallen down a narrow fissure some two years earlier. I proceeded to pull a contorted clothes hanger out of my pack, and began to fish for the rappel device. It only took a few attempts, but I was able to retrieve my long lost piece of equipment. Oh, the bliss! What could be a more perfect reunion!
We sat in contentment at the bottom of the last drop of the Dorton Knob Smoke Hole’s Historical Entrance. This was the first time out of many that I was not forced to return out one of TAG’s most miserable stretches of cave, but instead, we routed out the much easier, Yuppie Boating Entrance. The pits (30, 42, 26, 53) were very easy to climb out thanks to the rigging efforts of others on prior trips. As the trip came to a close, I climbed the last rope to see a most beautiful site. Out of a dozen trips to the Dorton Knob Smoke Hole, I had never exited the cave once to see the light of day. The setting sun illuminated the surrounding karst and forest with a pleasant, orange hue. The site was truly breathtaking, especially after spending a grueling five hours underground. I climbed out of the cave into the crisp, cold mountain air, and walked back to the Gnat Hole to retrieve the entrance rope. After walking for a couple of minutes, I was back at the entrance we had so eagerly had entered. I laughed to myself as I thought about all the torture we had endured as we traveled between the two entrances, yet we only moved a few hundred feet on the surface. At the car, we sat and admired the sunset for a few moments longer before driving off the mountain, thus closing yet another chapter in the Dorton Knob Smoke Hole.
February 10, 2007
Matt Ketron, Matt Shohl, and I (Mike Green) drove to Dorton Knob on a sunny, Saturday afternoon. The three of us had previously planned that we would travel through the historical, Gnat Hole Entrance of the Dorton Knob Smoke Hole and out the Yuppie Boating Entrance in efforts to retrieve vast amounts of gear including pre-rigged ropes. Before entry, we had anticipated moving a large rock previously wedged into the already small, three-foot diameter entrance, but upon arrival, we realized that Chad and other members of the Yuppie Team had already removed it. Thanks guys!
I got on rope and began to slide down into the 30’ entrance drop, but like the rock before me, I became hopelessly stuck. After much squirming and a little help from Ketron, I got back out into the open. Bewildered, I stared down at my belly and questioned having gained too much weight to go back into the tight crawlways of the Dorton Knob Smoke Hole. It was not until we kicked down lose sediment that we noticed a stump lodged in the entrance. This “stump” turned out to be the bottom of a twenty-foot log! After this discovery, we finished knocking down the log and proceeded to rappel the 30’er. Standing at the bottom of the drop, memories of times long past began to erupt in the distant recesses of my mind. It had been almost two years since I had last stood in this very spot, and I wondered if this section of the Smoke Hole would be as daunting now as it had then. At least on this trip, we would not have to suffer through the nightmares of the Historical Entrance twice, for to our knowledge, we would be performing the first Historic Pulldown.
By the time Ketron and Schohl had rappelled the Gnat Hole, I had already free-climbed Jave’s Climb which is a tricky 15’ climbup proceeded by a 20’ pit. I rigged this barrier to enable an efficient way to pass off our gear, and of course, to help make the trip a little easier for my compatriots. After passing gear up on one side and down the other, we proceeded into the Horror Crawl.
The passage dubbed the Horror Crawl is just as nasty as I last recalled! The dimensions do not exceed a foot or two, and continues for approximately 150’. This must all be done as a belly crawl because there is no opportunity to sit up, turn around, or even to look backwards! However, the true challenge of the crawl comes from the narrow canyon that runs parallel to our place of agony. If one is to slide too far down into the canyon, energy must be expelled in order to pull oneself back up into traversable passage. As we literally inched our ways through this misery, I periodically passed buttons that had belong to a friend, Brian Gindling’s old cotton suit. I laughed as I thought of all those times we had entered and exited through this very crawlway with cheap and ineffective cotton suits. Of course now we would not ever dream of wearing such a thing in the Smoke Hole, but this was from an early era of our development as cavers. In addition to seeing remnants of our suits, I could spot knee pads, carabineers, gloves, and all sorts of other gear tragically and hopelessly lost in the depths of the Smoke Hole. After only thirty minutes or so, I was relieved to be standing at the top of the first, in-cave pit (33’). After we had all rappelled this pit, I learned that this would be the first pulldown trip for both Ketron and Shohl. I could only image what it must have felt like for the two as they, for the first time, pulled down our ropes, and therefore stranding us in the cave. At this point, we were no longer able to go back out the way we had traveled, thus invoking a most anxious and uncomfortable feeling.
Following a hundred feet of hands and knees crawling, we were at the second pit (45’). From here, there is a tricky climbup and climbdown which leads to a room where we caught back up to the water; however, we quickly lost sight of the water again as we entered a 1000’ dry, overfollow, hands alcove that is mostly hands and knees crawling. The crawl ends at the next and final pit in the Historical Entrance (44’), but I had one last objective to commence: retrieving my rack that had fallen down a narrow fissure some two years earlier. I proceeded to pull a contorted clothes hanger out of my pack, and began to fish for the rappel device. It only took a few attempts, but I was able to retrieve my long lost piece of equipment. Oh, the bliss! What could be a more perfect reunion!
We sat in contentment at the bottom of the last drop of the Dorton Knob Smoke Hole’s Historical Entrance. This was the first time out of many that I was not forced to return out one of TAG’s most miserable stretches of cave, but instead, we routed out the much easier, Yuppie Boating Entrance. The pits (30, 42, 26, 53) were very easy to climb out thanks to the rigging efforts of others on prior trips. As the trip came to a close, I climbed the last rope to see a most beautiful site. Out of a dozen trips to the Dorton Knob Smoke Hole, I had never exited the cave once to see the light of day. The setting sun illuminated the surrounding karst and forest with a pleasant, orange hue. The site was truly breathtaking, especially after spending a grueling five hours underground. I climbed out of the cave into the crisp, cold mountain air, and walked back to the Gnat Hole to retrieve the entrance rope. After walking for a couple of minutes, I was back at the entrance we had so eagerly had entered. I laughed to myself as I thought about all the torture we had endured as we traveled between the two entrances, yet we only moved a few hundred feet on the surface. At the car, we sat and admired the sunset for a few moments longer before driving off the mountain, thus closing yet another chapter in the Dorton Knob Smoke Hole.
Thanks! ;D
