In December of 1985, I got to tag along with 4 experienced cavers in a spectacular karstic area about 1/4 mile or less upstream from the Sumidero Boqueron ( which we could allegedly hear roaring from our camp along the river bank. ( The nearest village was Comalapa, Veracruz about an hour hike away, although there were about 50 people speaking Nahautl living in thatched huts near an upstream cave from our camp. The 4x4 road seemed to end at the huts and we had a 1/4 kilometer hike down to our camp from there. The nearest town was Zongolica, Veracruz which was I do not believed sold gasoline at that time. )
3 of the cavers planned to hike from our camp around a huge hill to the presumed resurgence of the sumidero and enter the unknown with 2 inflatable rafts. My task was to provide surface support. About 1/2 way along the hike to the resurgence, we came up on 2 farmers chopping and burning a crop. The Mexican caver leading the group ( Jorge Ramirez of Mexico City ) asked them about caves. And they replied something to the effect of, "what do you think we are standing in?" To our surprise less than 15 feet from a well travelled goat trail was a 5 meter diameter pit that looked climbable to about 7 meter depth without rope that appeared to have going horizontal passage. We were so pressed for time, and just continued hiking. I volunteered to check it out later and Jorge and the other caver ( El Pollo - Jose Luis Soberanes, also of Mexico City ) led me into the unknown cave. I was super impressed with the cave having never been in a virgin cave or a cave with that much potential. The others returned the next day and sketched the cave which certainly somehow tied into the system there. I was not experienced enough at the time to understand tropical river caving all. But I got spoiled by that early experience. This was a biology trip. I learned about 50% of what I know about caving on that one week long trip, and will be forever grateful to Steve and Lori Robertson of Albuquerque, N.M., and Alejandro " Alex" Villagomez, R.I.P ( Alex was not there, but led us all on a cave trip in a world-class cave near Ixmiquilpan, Hidalgo on the last portion of our road-trip across Mexico ). David Locklear ( at that time, an Aggie Caver )
_______________________________________________ Texascavers mailing list | http://texascavers.com Texascavers@texascavers.com | Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/texascavers@texascavers.com/ http://lists.texascavers.com/listinfo/texascavers
