Whipple Cave

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Strange frost heave patterns in the rocky ground	Jeremiah and Paul on rappel	Jeremiah's first attempt on rope
Coming down through one side of the double entrance	Paul and Cliff? on rappel	Almost down
Mike took this one, so I am actually in the shot		Recently broken formations inside the cave
The rooms are enormous	Cliff heading up into the overlook area	Mike took a slower approach
Lee in the overlook	Dozens of stalactites and soda straws can be seen	Yet more of them
Up in the overlook	Strange angle on the stalactites	Looking out into the room
Ripples in the drapery		First view of the tower--we kicked up a little dust obviously
Clifton under the column	Jason and the tower--taken by Lee	Clifton and one of many walls covered in formations
Clifton	The column	Lee and a wall
First view of the pools1	Using other peoples lights	Long exposures with other peoples lights highlighting things
Person in the darkness as well		Paul and Clifton behind pools
Pools at eye level	Reflections in the pools	People moving behind the pools
Ripples from a water drop in the pool	Lee and wall covered in formation	Paul examing some of the small crystals
Small delicate stuff	More small stuff	And yet more of it
Column from further down the cave	Long exposures	Lee to the left of the column--it is big!
Lee again	Clifton looking at a hidden pool	CLimbing back up through the breakdown
Tricky move--don't let the rock tip.... :-)	Paul in a window to another underground world	Formation with a lot of color
Lee on the way back up through the breakdown section	People at the base of the entrance drop	Lee headed back up the massive passage
Light from the entrance	Split entrance	Pool in upper piece of cave
Lee and pool in the bat area of the cave	Looking down on Clifton either being beaten, or geared up for the ascent	Sliding back to the entrance
On ascent	Mike waving hello as he takes a break	Learning to get over an edge on the frog system
Lee headed on up	Lee	Over the edge
Wave of success	Baby buzzards in the nest above the entrance	Looking down on the bridge over the entrance
Whipple Cave was highly interesting. The trip starts out by looking at the buzzard nest above the entrance--not overly reassuring when you think about your chances of survival. Then you walk down the 50-60 feet of sloping rappel. It is possible to free climb it, but definitely not recommended. After the rappel there is only one other required difficult climb, which is made much easier with either a handline, or having the last person back up stretch for the hold. There are many formations, including several beautiful rimstone pools. However the most dramatic formation is the enormous stalagmite/tower which from the ground appears to be only inches from forming a complete column. There is also some damage present in the cave--we noticed some of it was brand new, which is dissapointing to see in such a beatiful and well known cave.
Anyone figure out what this was?	Jeremiah and Damian explore the mobile (crane?)	Water bubbling up a small hole at the warm spring
This is where some of the water comes up	Jeremiah playing with quicksand in the spring	Beatiful ending for this day
Bullfrog--this one had gone on to a better place	Reflections in the spring	Clouds over the desert
Sun going down over Nevada	Sunset	The warm spring made an excellent place to take a bath from the cave. It was also interesting to see that much water coming out of the ground in the middle of such dry country. There is a state campground located near the spring with pit toilets. It is pretty well aimed at camper type vehicles, with lots of room to turn around.