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Ahh, those North Florida summer weekends. Sometimes they do pay off. My buddy Dave Young and I went down south of Wakulla today and looked for an un-poked sink out in the trees that we heard about last weekend. We got a fix on it from a fisherman who happened to be at a neighboring sink, but the route he described, through a few hundred yards of dense steamy summertime jungle, was a bit unappealing. Better to go find that one in the winter, when it's drier and the undergrowth is considerably less dense. So instead, we continued south to the cave we discovered several months ago. Viz, work, family stuff, timing, etc. had conspired to keep us away from this place for too long -- but these ancient sinks aren't going anywhere, so what's the hurry, right? I hopped in with a power snorkel, just to check the viz below ten ft. It was as clear as we could want once you were below the 1st 6ft. of new rain and a bit of runoff. So far we've made around 10 dives here, checking the entire sink (about the size of Emerald, 50 ft. diam. at the surface, 98ft. diam at 60 ft., bigger at the floor which is 100ft deep). We've put one red Dive-rite reel of line in and have a comfy, 20x20ft., going cave with max. depth of 80 ft. So we went along the line, checking out the enormous crayfish, moving the line to better positions and checking our tie-offs. But on the way in, one of the alcoves about a hundred feet from the entrance, that we thought we had checked before, seemed blacker than we remembered. This time, on the way out, I tied in, and with Dave following, headed along the left wall, swam over to it and saw nothing but void! How we missed it before, I don't know. As we reeled in, the tunnel curved left and continued on as a dark yawning opening, becoming big enough for two divers to scooter comfortably side by side. Excellent! But then I looked to the right and -- it did the same thing in that direction too! A new upstream and downstream junction. So that's 3 going leads in our new cave! Not monstrous -- not deep. But virgin, going, and ours. Ahh, those North Florida summer weekends. Christopher A. Brown Sci-Graphica PR and DOCENT FILMS The Technical Diving Video Library (TDVL) (N.Am. & Canada): 1-800-373-7222 Outside US:904-942-7222 Fax:904-942-1240 Life is short -- this is not a rehearsal.
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