Camp's Gulf Caverns - Newbies going underground.

Dale Shearer, Tim Boccaleri, Billy Crews, Roy Andrews & Shawn McKee

Trip Report by Billy Crews

My wife, Kay, turned around and replied: "You're going where to do what?!?" OK, that's going to be a "no", I thought. After giving her all the known-to-the-moment details, I finally got a yard pass for my initial Southern Canyoneers (SC) adventure. This long weekend, dead of the winter trip would be an exploration of the Camp's Gulf Caverns, a wild cave system located due north of Chattanooga, Tennessee. On this trip I would be joining my long time friend Shawn McKee and other SC members Dale Shearer, Andy "Roy" Andrews and Tim Boccaleri.

I left work that Thursday a little early to raid the local Walmart of all its "spelunking gear": A cheap headlight, batteries, extra batteries, Dickies, $50.00 worth of chemical glow sticks, snacks and extra batteries. I added my new purchases to my cache of gear at home (boots, gloves, hard hat and duct tape). Kissing the family bye, I hit the road, heading north to Brandon, MS. I arrived at Shawn’s house near midnight, found the couch and managed three hours of rest as Shawn woke me promptly at 3: AM. With the rest of the house waking up, I met the crew already there and we shook hands all around. Since I had drove up from SoLA and Tim had come up from Biloxi, MS, we two could have used some more shut-eye but we were just as anxious as the two locals, (Shawn and Dale) to get started. I would meet Roy for the first time later that day as he was en route, solo, from L'il Rock, AR. As Shawn got the coffee going, the rest of us headed outside in the pitch black morning and started transferring the gear from various vehicles into the infamous “McKee White Party Van”. As organized as could be, we finally started trekking towards Tennessee at about 4: AM.

As this was my "induction" trip into the SC gang, I felt like I was being baptized. Along with a lot of southern, good old boy ribbing of each other, you're likely to come across some inner competition amongst the group from time to time. Case in point: The coveted Gear-Head Award – Given to the individual with the neatest, most technologically advanced, gadget that one couldn't possibly do without, (or really even need) in the middle of no where. Just about all the way to Tennessee, Shawn and I shared pilot/co-pilot duties as Dale and Tim argued over whose handheld GPS unit more accurately identified our exact position, heading, altitude, speed... Hell, all I knew, and needed to know, was that we were headed due east on the interstate. The “award” was a tie, needless to say. We made a late morning pit stop in Birmingham, AL where we met up with Reed Hilton, another SC member and experienced caver. After a late breakfast, Reed led us through the woods and into and through the cave on a table napkin. (I’m sure my wife would be so glad at how well we planned and prepared for this trip...). Shawn and Reed discussed our trip, time-wise, as Reed was our “Call Out”. -Your “Call Out” is the individual you telephone upon safely exiting the cave. If the call out isn't made by the prearranged time, he is your 911 team leader and link to the outside world.

Late Friday afternoon finally saw us arriving at our Base Camp: The Resort at Fall Creek Falls State Park. Not long after we arrive Roy showed up in the parking lot. The gang was all here... meeting called to order. After checking in and finding our rooms we made our way to the resort’s main dining hall which featured a buffet style dinner. With the entire team in attendance, seated, and with a full plate of food, we laid out our strategy for Saturday’s assault on the cave. With our plans made and our stomachs full, we walked off the evening’s meal in the clear, cold night along a path that follows the shoreline of the park’s lake. Here is where I started to feel excitement as Shawn educated us about what we would find the next morning.

Saturday morning came delivering with it a fine mist which later became a steady drizzle in the cool winter air. “Perfect caving weather…” Shawn commented as we loaded into Roy’s truck and headed out. Since this was my first cave trip, I could only go along with Shawn’s weather assessment. We idled over to the lobby of the resort where Shawn amazed us with the truths laid down the night before by his previous trip to this particular cave: Since the cave entrance was on land recently placed in the state park, it was public land. Due to the fact that Camp's Gulf Caverns was wild, enormous, unmapped and unmanned, it was the park’s policy to be totally ignorant of any such cave on their property. We gathered at the front desk as Shawn inquired about directions: “...well I thought this was the correct road to get to the cave in Camp's Gulf.” To which the bee-hive hair-do’ed park employee replied: “Cave, what cave? I don’t know what you’re referring to sir, there are no caves in this area that I’m aware of.” Wow! This cave turned out to be so big I thought the state of Tennessee was hollow, and she wasn't about to acknowledge a hole that big in her own back yard! I guess this is what certain government employees refer to as “plausible denial ability”… I suppose that includes certain park services also.

Thirty minutes later, and the third time we passed the unmarked entrance trail, Shawn found the spot. Since he was the only one of our group to have previously made this trip, he was our assumed group leader. Roy veered off the road and onto a trail that was almost as smooth as a bad moon-buggy trip. Exiting the truck we all began climbing into our coveralls, testing lighting equipment, checking each other for ample gear, food, and water. As our team of five made its way through the damp, cold woods, I couldn't help but think, again, of Shawn’s comment regarding the “perfect caving weather”. After a ten minute hike through the woods, the obvious trail became reduced to nothing more than a cow-path ending on top of a ridge. As I topped out on the ridge I suddenly understood why the local geography was named such. “Gulf” is hillbilly for canyon or gorge; the path at my feet descended fifty feet or so rapidly down a multitude of slick trails and all ending at the cave opening. The opening itself was directly at the bottom of a near shear bluff which ascended well over a hundred feet. We all slip-footed down the trails and gathered at the cave entrance which was quite adequate enough to handle a school bus or two.

It was 9:AM and after shedding our cold weather layers and storing them in some crevices we lighted up and made our way to the back of the entrance tunnel. This entrance to Camps Gulf Caverns is a classic tunnel going under the mountain and ending, after a hundred yards or so, at a breakdown. Nearing the the back of the tunnel, I noticed three changes in the physical world: First was the smell - it was an aroma of rich, dark, virgin soil. I think this must be what it smells like when you're buried. It wasn't a bad smell, just a permanent "earth" smell. Next, I noticed we had passed the “twilight” zone - which is what I've been told is part of what defines a cave - permanent darkness. Finally, we had passed a thermocline. I was familiar with thermoclines from my SCUBA days. Just like descending the depths of the ocean on a dive, you go from one temperature and in the next step the temperature changes twenty degrees. Passing through the thermocline is like the cave saying “welcome, come on in.”. In the summer, the temp drops, but being this was a winter trip, the cave was warmer than the outside air. Here, the effects of the outside world were now over-ruled by the caves own internals. Taking the lead,Shawn attacked the breakdown hoping to find the correct way into the first cavern, or the “Registry Room”. I remember Reed commenting on how tricky it would be to get through this part as some cavers get lost here or never even make it through, and, how he’d be shocked if we ever got past the end of the entrance tunnel. Shawn slithered through a squeeze and disappeared as we waited. Twenty minutes later we heard Shawn coming down... “I got it [the trail], were in.” Success!

We followed Shawn up the collapsed breakdown and through a few squeezes. A couple of the squeezes were quite vertical in nature and actually required us to remove our backpacks for clearance. The going was definitely tight as we switch-backed our way up. Bringing up the rear, I marked every blind turn with a glow stick. I had remembered Reed saying how some cavers that attempted Camps Gulf would sometimes go past the exit tunnel when descending the break down and actually wind up underneath the first room or entrance tunnel - we would not get lost coming out. After gaining nearly fifty feet in elevation, we finally topped the inside of the breakdown. Shawn pointed out a dirty rope, left by previous cavers, which would help us make the final entry into the first big room. Tim, Dale and Roy made the twelve foot climb and I followed. I don’t think I could have done it without the rope. After thirty minutes of hard work, we were finally back on our feet - but not by much. My heart sank a little as I watched the guys inch to their right along a ten inch wide ledge. This maneuver required your face to be pressed against the wall with your arms and feet stretched out. At our back was another wall, but it was six to ten feet away across a seemingly bottomless pit. Are we having fun yet? At least I survived and maintained my status as a caver: The terminology was later explained to me - Caver: One who caves. Spelunker - one who has gone spelunk. Spelunk - the sound you make from falling from a height of fifty feet or greater. LOL, OK, I get it...

The ledge eventually worked up hill and widened granting us a grand view of pitch black emptiness: The Registry Room. Our lights bounced around (as well as our voices) showing us exactly what Shawn had described: Each large room will resemble an empty dome except for the huge pile of junk cars littering the floor and peaking in the center. In reality the “floor” was actually the “ceiling” which had collapsed eons ago and the “junk cars” were boulders of varying shapes and sizes. I tried my best to not think of the relationship between the ceiling and the floor or how the shape of one would fit into or over the other. –It just wasn't mentally healthy to wonder when the “new” floor might be getting installed. The Registry Room, aka Exposition Hall, is aptly named due to the “sign in” register located in the far right corner of the round room. This room is the smallest of the three measuring 456' long by 429' wide with a 107' ceiling. We boulder hopped to the back, right side and located the PVC pipe containing the register and all “signed in”. It wasn't hard to locate, because directly above it, mounted on the wall, was a sign giving warning as to the penalties for removing artifacts, fossils, minerals.... Well, here we were, miles from civilization, under a mountain in total darkness and the government had found us - bummer. It was here where we took our first real break when I took notice of the details regarding the cave’s climate.

Like most, if not all, TAG (Tenn.-Ala.-Ga. area) caves, Camp's Gulf maintains a constant temperature of approximately sixty deg. at 100% relative humidity. Mobility in this cave was tough, so although the air seemed cool, you sweat-ed your ass off getting around. The fact that you could become soaking wet in a cool environment is what makes one element of caving so dangerous: Wet coupled with cold could, in the right conditions of injury or immobility, lead to hypothermia or worse. The air itself seemed heavy and became even more so, say, when you knocked the dust off your clothing only to watch it suspend indefinitely in front of your face. At least in this portion of the cave, the air was dead still. Or, in caving parlance – “the cave didn't “breathe” right here”. The same went for our own breathing as the co2 clung to the air in front of you. The huge, talus floor, although made of SUV sized solid rocks, was coated in a thin film of wet silt and dust thus evidencing periodic flooding. Sometimes the rocks were damp, sometimes slippery and at other times sticky. -Nasty stuff.

After the standard ten minute break, Shawn rallied us on towards the second room. Like all good SC members know, you must follow certain rules to insure safety: The 50/10 rule (50 minutes of humping it and then a 10 minute break) and the BREAD rule (Breath, Rest, Eat And Drink) are "death march" standards. As we reorganized , Shawn bouldered ahead so as to film us crossing the Registry “floor”. If you have the opportunity to do so, please view this short film: A Dark Passage. This short footage is a good example of how "well" we “see” in the inky darkness. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0w5NWQAGso When we finally caught up with Shawn on the far side of the room he commented “Whose light is that over there?” We all turned back around and spotted the small beacon from over a football field away. “Damn” Roy stated, “Its mine.” During the break, Roy had emptied his pack and using a backup flashlight had set up his mobile stereo system: A new IPOD mp3 player connected to two mini stereo speakers. (An attempt at securing the Gear Head Award?) Caving is fun, but it can be work and the mind tires as easy as the body. Since Shawn had rested by filming us, he volunteered to retrieve the light for Roy. Here's more footage, set to the tunes of Led Zepplin: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KnCxdijWzwY

Reunited and exiting the Registry Room, we continued deeper into the cave, surrounded by boulders, empty space, a few jabs of light dancing wildly around, and the sounds of Led Zepplin coming from every possible angle that sound could travel to and from. Shawn stayed on point and I, as sweeper, secured a glow stick in such a way that it would be easily visible from the opposite direction - on the way out. This procedure would become my habit as we entered and exited each chamber and at every highpoint we mounted. Shawn, pushing the lead, found the trunk passage connecting the first two chambers. About middle way of this passage I noticed the ceiling starting to get lower when all of a sudden - POK! I ran right into the lowering roof. OK, the hard-hat looked goofy, but it just saved my life; well at least a few minutes of it. I took off my head gear and inspected the new gouge; yep, I’d be sleeping good by now if it weren’t for the protection. The ceiling became so low that we eventually had to crawl a short distance before it opened up towards a short climb, which allowed access to the second chamber; the Rotunda. This second room, and second largest, measures in with a length of 458' and width of 381'. The “short” ceiling is a mere 66' high. Jamming to Roy’s output of Zepplin, our team of five crossed the Rotunda with me marking the usual spots with glow sticks.

On the far side of the Rotunda we found the passage leading into the third room. We ascended into Echo Hall, as the third chamber is known, via a sharp, steep and wet incline of talus. Making for the top of the “floor” in Echo Hall was pure work. It was a crawl that seemed to go nearly straight up. Roy turned down the volume so we could communicate each hand and foot hold to the ones below. Communicating, even at short distances, seemed nearly impossible. The sound reverberates off every rock face and collects back in your ear as a complete jumble. We found that we could only speak, when separated by distance, by using one syllable words very slowly: Go - No - Yes... An occasional call of “Rock!” would go out so as to advise the team members underneath that something loose was on its way down. It was during this ascent that I notice some strange looking rocks. They actually appeared to be fossilized reams of standard size paper. After studying the ancient looking slates, I gambled: With a stone the size of my fist, I struck the layered rock on one of its “long” edges. It actually separated! Twice more I struck on the largest pieces until I had managed about four “sheets” of rock. Turning them over, one revealed a perfectly fossilized flower in the dead center. I could only say it resembled a Daisy, but its only a guess. What a great prize I had found; hidden in the forest floor on top of a hill for millenia and then to be forced through the ceiling of the cavern and once again become the floor. If it weren’t for that damned sign in the Registry! I think it was Tim or Dale who woke me up: “Hey - you joining us up here?” They had made the top and I soon caught up. We must have scaled seventy-five feet just to reach the floor of this great room: Echo Hall, the largest of the three, spans 763 feet long and 369 feet wide. The ceiling is 164 feet from the top peak of the floor. What a grand hall this was! With over seven acres of emptiness, it is larger than the inside of the NOLA Super dome. Taking a break on top, we "played" with the echo before moving on.

Our next goal, should we get this far, (as Reed pointed out), would be the “mouth”. “It will be located in the “left” corner (of a round room)” Reed had reported to us. “You’ll know it when you see it-looking down, it has one big tooth, or fang, right in the middle.” It was in search of the “Mouth” that we found a most spectacular formation. We found it by ear as it was directly under a waterfall coming from the ceiling overhead. Although the sound came from every where, due to the echo, it was more defined down and to the left from the central pile. The eight foot tall formation resembled a statue that belonged in the middle of a fountain, say on an alien planet. As I did my BREAD bit, the rest of the guys covered every inch of the large “pretty” - they must have taken no less than one hundred pictures and from every different angle.

It was near here that we located some other formations, which we labeled the “brains” due to their appearance. They, too, were born from water falling from above. We even performed a few light experiments that Shawn mentioned he had heard about: In complete darkness we illuminated the “brains” from close range using the cameras’ flash equipment. The “brains”, being of amber color and slightly opaque, “retained” a small amount of light and continued to glow for a few seconds. Neat stuff.

We pushed on, down and to the left, as we made our approach to the mouth. Standing on the talus pile, we looked down and with our headlamps illuminated the opening. Reed was right on - nearly straight below us, thirty feet away, was a near circular grotto with one large stalactite hanging from the center. We found another rope, probably left behind by the same previous cavers, and made our way, one by one, into the subterranean chamber.

Going feet first, we descended the rope bottoming out in a near perfect tunnel. Except for the floor, which was covered in years of silt with a single “elephant trail” foot path, one could have taken the family for a Sunday drive down this very long bore hole. The tunnel averaged about forty feet wide and had a ceiling of twelve feet, off and on; every few hundred yards we would come to a section of tunnel where the ceiling had collapsed thereby “installing” a new floor and exposing a new “ceiling”. This feature, along with the occasional dirty ‘tite and ‘mite, gave further evidence of periodic flooding. As Roy kept the music coming, we marched single file, back towards the direction we came from - just a 100 feet or so lower in the earth. In other words, I was under the impression we were walking back towards the direction of the entrance tunnel, but we were now underneath all three chambers. And then a single thought crept into my mind: Every step in that direction is another step farther from the way we came - the way out. I pushed the thought away, but it wouldn’t stay gone... How long had we been down here? How far have we humped? What time was it? I had always thought I had a pretty fair internal clock. Now, completely submerged in the lower earth’s pitch black, my clock was no longer ticking.

A half hour later, we came to the first “Funnel of Doom” where we set up a small base camp of lanterns and music. We did some BREAD and shifted gears to Pink Floyd. Wrapping up the 10 from the last 50 we approached the funnel. The hole before us was nearly perfectly round and thirty feet across. The floor around it tapered slowly to the center then fell drastically, twenty feet straight down to a pool. (The permanent water table?) Since the funnel favored the right side of the bore hole the only way around was the left. It was here that we found tracks (six inch deep boot prints) leading to the far side. The tracks were centered three feet from the left wall and two feet from the funnel's edge. OK, I told myself, be careful; step only where others before you have been. I eased passed the funnel and just as I gained safe ground it happened: Tim, bringing up the rear, slipped. Falling forward, he landed on his chest in the slick mud. “Aww shit” he yelled, followed by “HELP!” He had begun to slip back.. He threw out his left hand and clawed at the wet earth, no good, he slipped more. This time he tried with his right - no good, back he went. Shawn and Roy, pushing for the end had separated from us slightly. I immediately laid down, facing Tim, and stretched for his hand with all I had. Dale had jumped at my feet to help hold me. No good, Tim was too far - we were going to lose him. With all he had, Tim again threw his left arm out and finally got some purchase on the slick mud. With Dale holding me by the ankles, I inched forward on my belly and we grabbed hands. Tim wiggled up to me and Dale and finally found good ground. He stood up and grinned: “I’m okay.” That Tim is one cool cucumber. We caught up to Shawn and Roy at the second Funnel of Doom and it was here that I succumbed to a near total mental collapse.

Shawn and Roy, pushing for the end, decided to continue to find the “lake” that was reported to be near the end of the line. The “lake” was a sump and probably of the same water table that the funnels were formed by. After much debate over which side was the correct side to cross the second funnel, our two pioneers continued on , Roy to the left and Shawn to the right. (It was later reported that Roy took the true “go” as Shawn had perhaps blazed a new trail.) They each made the crossing, turned the bend and were gone. And my mind said “You should go, too... the other way.” I gotta’ quit thinking like this, I’m just tired... “Now, you have to get out of here now.” I don’t feel good either, I thought. Then my brain screamed: “RIGHT NOW! YOU HAVE TO LEAVE RIGHT F*****G NOW!” Mustering every ounce of calmness in my body, I turned to Dale and told him: “I have a problem” “What?” he inquired. I told him, and Tim, that I had to leave, right now. They both blinked and looked at each other. I know they had heard me say something and I know my lips had moved. But for the sound of my heartbeat in my ears, I could hear nothing. Dale, sensing some trouble, finally asked if I was okay whereupon I sheepishly explained that I was having an anxiety attack. A real bad one, too. Dale saved my life: “No problem man, lets turn around here, the three of us, and go back to Base Camp Funnel and wait for Shawn and Roy to return.” As soon as I took that first step back, towards the direction out of the cave, I instantly felt better. Amazing. I later found out that the anxiety/panic attack I had suffered from is also know in caving terms as “Exit Fever”. Go figure. About forty-five minutes later, Roy and Shawn reported back to us that they had reached the end.

With Shawn and Roy rejoining us, we reorganized our gear and routed for the exit. Being good sports, the rest of the guys let me take point, for a while, and I set a pretty good pace as I still wanted out - Exit Fever? Can we have a hell yeah...? Heading up, down, over and under, glow sticks beckoned from hundreds of yards away; each chemical light seemed to quicken my step - to hell with that 50/10 crap, I want out. We decided to take a good long rest when we finally re-entered the Registry. What had taken us six hours to do going in had taken us only two coming out. Near total exhaustion and keeping quiet, we all laid back and rested. Every now and then I would flash my light across the chamber and catch a glimpse of the reflector on the large boulder which hid the exit through the breakdown behind it. The bike reflector was put up by cavers years ago as an exit marker for those on the way out. We were tired, filthy, sore, and hungry, but that reflector beamed confidence, so we also felt good.

And that was when the rock fell: You didn’t know what the cracking noise was at first, but when it found the floor, you knew – part of the ceiling had just came loose. Of course, Camp's Gulf had been loosing it’s ceiling for eons. The floor which we had hiked for hours was nothing but the ceiling at one time. Nobody said a word as the thunder echoed throughout the entire center of the earth. Nobody made as much as a cursory glance at another caver. Although I think we were all under the impression the rock had fallen in one of the other rooms, it was still an ominous event. I think it was Dale who commented: “it sounded as small as a Nissan.” But that wasn’t made mention of until we were out of the cave under the moon and stars. “Cave-ins” are taboo subjects while underground…

No - nobody said a word, but we all got up and began repacking our gear for the final hump out of ‘Camp's. It was like when you realize you suddenly overstayed your welcome. We stretched and massaged our filthy bodies and commenced to hike out and that was when we realized we had lost Roy.

We had all ran out of drinking water on the way out, so Roy had taken it upon himself to find some more. Earlier that day, when we first entered the Registry (or was it years ago?) we could hear water trickling from somewhere on the bottom of the room. It was this creek that Roy was in search of. He disappeared around a few boulders and just didn’t come back and nobody had noticed. We called for him, which was of no use. Sound echoed from every possible direction; it was no good, we would have to go look for him. The four of us began the descent to the un-investigated lower portion of the Registry. We couldn’t maintain voice contact, but I think we could all see the other’s lights bouncing around. But it was only four shafts of light; where the hell was Roy? Within about ten minutes, we had all found the creek flowing through the bottom of the room and there sat Roy. He had made a water run, sat down and just took a break... no big deal. As we neared his position, he switched his head lamp on and gave us a “What’s up?”

The water was cold and delicious. Although Roy had filtered it, I would wonder for weeks after the trip if this was the day I would be stuck in the bathroom...LOL. Rejuvenated and together again we ascended the rock pile and homed in on the bike reflector marking the exit. Descending the breakdown, we were all in high spirits, cutting up and joking all the way. We de-geared and cleaned off what we could in the entrance tunnel and walked outside into the cold night. It was 7:PM. We had caved for ten hours, and got in well under the prearranged call out time of midnight. When we made it back to Roy’s truck I produced a small flask of Crown Royal. Yes, I had held back on the guys in the cave when we ran out of water, but this was for celebrating - on the outside. We each took turns knocking back the flask, stoking a warm fire in our bellies. On the way back to our resort base camp, and as soon as the cell signal allowed, Shawn put in the call to Reed that all was well. Actually he put the call into Reed’s babysitter as he and the wife were having a night out: “Look, I know you don’t know me, but be sure and tell Reed that we made it out of the cave. You got that? We made it out of the cave and we're alright.”

Sunday morning came and with it a light snow. The Tennessee hills were dusted in a brilliant white blanket that was still coming down. A small snowball fight ensued as we packed the vehicles for the ride home. As we descended the Cumberland Plateau, making our way towards Chattanooga, I took notice of the weather outside: It was fiercely cold and snowing. Yep, it was perfect caving weather.