EOL???

First trip into the Upstream portion of a popular system (with an experienced guide) for my buddy and I, and what a fantastic dive we were having. Nice leasurely pace, taking in the scenery, and making pretty good, comfortable progress up the mainline. We turned the dive on thirds about 1200' in, and began to sightsee again on the way out. I was in the middle, with my buddy leading and our guide bringing up the rear. I thought the passage was getting smaller than I remembered it on the way in, but we were still folowing a line. The line was white, but that certainly wasn't alarming since in this system the gold braid turns to white after a distance to indicate that you've reached advanced terrain. My buddy stopped rather suddenly, and started looking around. I couldn't see exactly what he was doing, but at first I thought he had found something interesting, or was noting a jump he'd like to take later. He then turned to me, and circled a spot on the line where it appeared to make a sharp right turn, bending around a small outcropping of rock on the floor. I finned over to see what was up, and found that the line didn't continue, but rather was tied off to a rock - End of Line...I paused for minute, and I may even have physically scratched my head. We hadn't made any jumps, or hit any "T"s, but surely we didnt come this way. As we both sort of floated for a moment, trying to figure out exactly what happened, I felt my heart rate begin to increase, and a million thoughts began to swirl in my head. I wouldn't call it panic, but it was certainly the tell-tale signs of stress. I knew we weren't in emminent danger, but as we turned and headed back out the way we had come, I was still rather confused and worried. How could we have wound up on this line? If we mistakenly missed an obscure T on the way in here, what if there were no arrows on it indicating which way was out? Did our guide know where we were? I honestly dont remember if it was a T or an 18" jump, but I have never been more relieved in a cave than when we saw not one, not two, but the three line arrows attached to the mainline that we had inadvertantly vacated earlier. (How could we have missed three arrows is something that still wierds me out.)We proceeded to exit the cave, enjoying the numerous sights on the way out, but I'll tell you one thing - I certainly paid better attention to the line for the rest of that dive.


Lessons LEarned: 1. Especially on your first dive in a new system - keep your eye on the line, and glance back often. 2. Just because you are second in line doesn't mean you can be a tourist - you need to pay as much attention when you are following as you would if you were leading. 3. Whenever possible, find yourself a good guide when you want to dive a new system, someone who knows the system well. Could my buddy and I have made it back out without him? Most likely, but it sure as hell helped in a moment of stress to know that at least one person knew exactly where we were (he later indicated that he thought we made a decision to check this side passage out, and was wondering why we paused so long at the EOL).