The Druid Project

The search for a western entrance to the unexplored upper reaches of Druid Cave and for the resurgence of the Druid stream and possible downstream passage has led to the discovery of New Years Day Cave (1/1/2005), Hero Hole (12/31/2005), Original Sin Cave (6/4/2007) and Windy Slope Cave (6/8/2007).

All photos on this page were taken by Brian Masney except where otherwise noted.

© All rights reserved.

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Druid Cave

Currently 2.31 miles long.

Rigging Trip

July 3, 2006 

Aaron Bird at the entrance drop

Third Drop 

Fourth Drop

Fifth Drop

Greg Springer's NSS News article on Druid Cave 

Aaron Bird's Cavediggers.com article about rigging Druid

Unfinished Druid Cave Map

Here is a two part video taken by Aaron Bird of he and Dave Riggs on a second rigging trip into Druid--then being ferried out of the canyon by Brian Masney. 

Part 1: Approach
Part 2: In the cave

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New Years Day Cave

Currently 3,270 feet long

Dye tracing indicates that New Years Day Cave does not connect with Druid, but rather runs almost parallel to it. The stream in New Years Day comes out of Original Sin Cave and then flows into Druid Cave  

Discovery

Aaron Bird, Brian Masney, Rocky Parsons and I  rendezvoused at 8:30am on New Years Day, 2005, to go work on our Druid dig. This time we were packing in some heavier duty tools for widening the very low passage we had been working. After descending into the canyon, we set to work pulling rocks out of the dig--with two people working inside at a time. We made quite a bit of progress through the morning, and the squeeze slowly became less of a squeeze--but it was still a pretty miserable hole. It had gotten wet and muddy since we started digging back in November 2004--but it was definitely moving air.

Cara Doud working the original dig,  November, 2004. 

Jason Thomas joined us at 10:30 or so. He had stayed up late for New Years Eve and hadn't wanted to come out so early in the morning. It was nice to have an extra hand as we continued to dig. Jason also walked up the river a bit, looking for other holes.

Eventually, the clouds gave way and it started to warm up a bit. It felt more like March than New Years Day. Rocky, Aaron, Jason and I went to the hillside across from the dig to sit in the sun and eat lunch while Brian continued to work inside. As we were sitting there, Jason asked if anyone had checked out a hole he  had seen within about 50 feet up the hill from the dig. Aaron said that he and other people had checked up the area more than once and that they hadn't found anything. Oh well.

Aaron had to leave shortly after that and the four of us left regrouped. Jason and Jason and Rocky focused on a sucking hole beneath a massive sandstone boulder. When one got in the right position, you could see a crack that led into what looked like cave passage--and it was sucking quite a bit of air. Brian and I continued digging in the old squeeze dig while Jason and Rocky worked the new hole. Eventually, Brian and I decided to give up on the squeeze and go help Rocky and Jason. After an hour or so of digging, there was only one rock keeping us out of what certainly looked like cave. Jason patiently and gradually wriggled it out and the hole was enterable.

Jason went in first. He looked around and made a disgusted remark, which made us think it was a dead-end. Rocky said, "Oh well, I've been disappointed before." Then Jason yelled, "Wait, it's walking passage and it goes!" That was all we needed. The rest of us followed him through the awkward entrance. It was definitely cave. The entrance passage led downhill to a climbdown into 20 foot high canyon passage. We paused for a photograph then proceeded to scoop a little booty--almost all of it walking passage with one short stoop section and a few climbs. There were leads everywhere. We kept in mind, however, that this project was Aaron's baby, so we only scooped about 150 feet of passage. We stopped in a room that was fifteen feet wide, about thirty feet long and about thirty feet high. There were crinoids everywhere in the room. We squeezed back out the entrance and called Aaron on Brian's cell phone. Ouch. Aaron wanted to come back and go in right then and there, but it was 4:30pm and we had been digging and caving all day and were tired and hungry. Jason named it New Years Day Cave.

NYDC Push Trip on 7/10/05