Sardine Cave Explore…
Last November Deb and I did a hike up the Mayflower trail up and over Sardine Mountain and on our way back down we happened to spot what appeared to be a cave way across the canyon. Ever since then we’ve talked about finding it. Comparing pictures, topo’s, and Google Earth we knew where it was on the map. Comparing the map with lidar we were able to devise a route using old road beds that traversed the steep slope over to the deep narrow drainage that the cave was hanging over.
The day finally came, weather was ok…a bit damp in the morning but dried up throughout the day. This was not a canyoneering trip so we brought our climbing gear in case we needed to climb into the cave, or rappel off a cliff to escape.
After thrashing a couple of miles on abandoned road beds we got to where we needed to rappel just to get into the drainage. The drainage was choked with large logs and over grown with thick vegetation making the travel slow. Finally getting to where we thought the cave would be…close but a bit lower. The cave turned out to be very shallow. Not as big or deep as we hoped, but still worth finding.
We continued to drop the drainage coming to an 80’ water fall. After rapping the falls, we continued down to the main Sardine tributary and back to the car.
Fun adventure with my favorite adventure partner, Deb Hill 😊
This is what we saw when we spotted the cave months before… Zoom in to see the cave
Right out of the car…the thrash begins 🙂
On the abandoned road bed…by the size of the trees it’s been abandoned for 30-40+ years…
Looks like a belt pulley from the logging days…heavy chunk of steel now.
Deb saw a bird fly from this nest of eggs. We left the scene quickly so the bird would come back to the nest…
Find Deb…
Rappelling down into the narrow drainage…
Here comes Deb…
Was hoping for better, instead we rapped into a drainage choked with large logs and thick vegetation…
We could hear a trickle of water but it was way under all the debris…
Ahh, the cave!
Well, this is it…the cave we came looking for. The cave we saw from the side of Sardine Mountain months ago…
Cave rubble…
Maybe in another 5000 years…
Inside the cave. We didn’t spend too much time here…and certainly didn’t touch anything for fear of a collapse…
Back to descending the drainage…
Ugh!!
Near the confluence with the main Sardine Tributary, we had to drop an 80′ falls. Deb on rappel…
Karl on rappel…
Luckily not much water because we didn’t bring the wet suits…
Back on the main Sardine tributary…long creek slog back to the lower shuttle…
Today’s thrash…
