Cannonball

[Kelly Jessop]

Great dive today,thanks folks!!!

[ed pavey]

Ohhh! Things are back to normal here.. All of the out of towners are gone and CB is back to all of its glory... Found a xl dog clip w/ a line on it at 180 feet. Anyone want to claim it?? Conditions are outstanding, vis really clears up at at 180 and gets only better..
vis in the upper tunnel are still good, 40+..

[Jason Wheate]

What part of Cannonball were you in? Deep enough to be properly narced?

WJH

Not Cannonball. A old sand mine,5 miles of tunnels and 100 ft vis!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[skip]

The cannonball dive was excellent. The surface support was supportive, the in-water support was there when needed and viturally absent when not needed. It was a valet-dive experience!

Visibility in the lake was about like diving cow crap sink in Tennessee, but going down the marker line towards the entrance was like coming out of the fog at night on a country highway to see the clarity of the milky way. The waters parted, the brown swirls gave way to clear water and our lights reflected back to us sparkling off the rocky gravelly bottom and the hard rock overhang of the low entrance.

The current was running pretty good and I dug in with my hands and planted both heels on the low overhead to wiggle and pull myself in. Michael Angelo just ahead of me and Mike Young darting in beside me like a natural born eel! The low ceiling, the high flow, three divers entering, and the incredible viz made me pause to take it in, to look around in this subterranean underwater world.

I'd been here before, but this time I could see just how wide and low the passage really is. It spreads out like a vast table, a horizontal crack, and I couldn't help but think of being a mere insect about to be squashed by the sole of a giants boot. I pulled and kicked on in and out from under and around a large boulder, following the mainline. We'd dropped of the O2 deco bottles at the bucket, before entering the narrow crack, and now on the other side, the passage opened up above and all around us reminding me of Florida caves. I could see it all, no matter where my light shone.

We swam along with our lights scanning side to side, and up and down. I tend to swim low to watch the floor. I don't know why exactly - my poor eyesight coupled with a keen interest in the very small I suppose - but I seem to always be the one down on the floor. This was not the best place to be today what with the high flow, so after examining the rotting carcasses of a few large fish of unidentifiable species, and following close on the tail of a small eel (or perhaps the infamous cannonball salamander), I rose up and did my best to "dive the cave." I stayed behind outcroppings hiding from the flow until time to turn around them, stayed high near the ceiling, and found it much easier to keep up with Michael Angelo who seemed hell-bent on a mission ahead!

And he was. Our mission, his mission, was to drop to the bottom, go through the restriction, and draw/sketch it from the other side. I was just along for the ride, a buddy for the deep section. As I got into the dedicated groove of swimming at a good clip on Michael Angelo's heels, my thoughts turned once again to the incredible views around me. Large flat clay areas gave way to boulder strewn rocky areas, and then ahead looking like something straight out of the Mojave Desert the Arches appeared! The passage did not so much as narrow, or so it seemed, as two large wide bows of rock emerged from the sides and bisected the cave ahead of us. One arched over the bottom and the second arched over the first forming two windows above and below, slightly off-center from one another. I took the middle passage and Mike Young dropped down to duck under the lower arch.

Before much longer we arrived at the drop-off, about 16 minutes into the dive. We dropped down, switching gas at the 70 foot depth, dropping off stages, and then continued dropping straight down to the bottom. As I fell freely downward, with Michael Angelo right below me, my light coupled with his danced all around the vertical walls of this many-faceted chimney of rock. The hole narrowed and ledged and fish stopped to stare into our lights.

We kept dropping down and I began to imagine that there was no bottom here, that we had entered a black hole of water, not of space. A place where time did not exist; a place where space was infinite and yet confined, folded back on itself, so we were not so much as dropping down, but simply dropping. And this is as it should be I thought. Why do we spend so much of our time busy with plans, goings, and comings, and doings, and trying so desperately to make things happen? As if time is our enemy and we must outrun it. As if space is our enemy and we must fill our tanks, drive our cars, run ourselves into the ground. No, this is reality; here and now, this free-fall into the darkness that suspends time and space and brings a peaceful smile to my face. Why cave dive? Because it brings us back to who and what we are to that enlightened state of metaphysical unencumbrance of the zen masters, the tibetan monks, the bhudda. If only for a moment.

Then the cave narrowed, Michael Angelo stopped, and we were at the bottom! One second I was transcending reality and the next reality appeared as suddenly as getting spit out of a worm-hole. We paused and took stock, giving ok's all around, checking run-times, and seeing that time had indeed gotten away from us, it was time to go already! No sketching this trip.

We began our ascent. At 190, Michael Angelo developed a leaking inflator, bubbles danced frantically, pouring out of the inflator nipple - a blown o-ring. Disconnected he now was on oral inflation, but inflation was not an issue as we continued our ascent to rejoin Mike Young who stayed above us at the 150 foot mark. We stopped every so often, to stay with our runtimes, keep on schedule, and were soon picking up the 70-foot tanks and switching gases for the short swim back through the passage to our deco gas waiting in the lakebed.

I marvelled again at the incredible viz, some said 50-60 feet, but I'd say 75-100. My light illuminated rock wherever I aimed the beam and I suppose I swam faster than I meant to, because it seemed way too soon that we arrived at the larger boulder with the mainline wrapped around it ducking under the overhang. I stopped and turned to take one last look at cannonball cave, then turned back to inspect the cannonball plaque, and then ducked under the overhand with Michael-Angelo on my heels. Mike Young had gone "round the other way" and came up on us with ok's and grins all around. The current didn't dally and so neither did we as cannonball spit us out into the lake.

Although we had a nice long deco to do, I felt the dive was over. I sat back on the O2, looked around the murky lake water mixing with clear spring water, cold and warm currents eddying around us, settling into the quiet reflection of deco. We dove cannonball! What a great system. Next time, I thought, I'll spend more time in the main passage and won't go so deep. There is so much going on in there...too much for one or two dives, or even a dozen. Be there eels or be there salamanders? And why/how do so many large fish carcasses litter the floor? Do fish, like humans, know they are going to die and thus seek a cave for their last moments, swimming against the current to find a suitable buriel ground? I am convinced that underwater caves contain important lessons for the examined life, lessons that all humankind needs to learn. Lessons that at once reveal simple truths, afford greater understanding and tolerance, and remind us that life is more than highways and gas stations, obama's and mc cains, work and family, more even than a planet of humans.

-skip

[outofayr]

Awesome read, Skip! Thanks for the post. Wish I had been there, but through your post I felt like I was. +1 on the way cave diving makes a cave diver feel.

Brian

[ed pavey]

Cannonball is awesome!!! Vis is great.. The lake is clear enough to dive...

Well out from the spring and below 15 feet... 2 foot of lake vis...

[deepairmike]

awsome report Skip! You are an artist with words!

[ed pavey]

The lake has cleared to around 4 feet vis... Flow is up a little but still low.. Vis in the cave is near 50 ft. with spots of lower... lake temp is close to the same as spring.. Cavern zone is present at the cannonballs..

[ed pavey]

Lake temp is dropping and vis is increasing in thed lake so much that you can see ambient light from beyond the cannonballs.. Vis in the cave is 45 to 50 with low flow..

Dove with Ken from Y-kiki, it was his first time in CB.. I dought if it his last..

Also Not so big Bob, Bill Harrison, Jon Connally, Earnie Wilson, and Heidi McMullin