I don't think of myself as an "
adrenaline junky ", but my sport does have an obituary type section in many
online forums and groups.
To be deeply involved in something, it is usually inevitable to
lose most perspective about the value of, or motivations behind the things we
do. Especially inherently risky things like rock climbing and caving. Why do I do this? Is this sane, or healthy?
Waiting my turn at the start of he cave, I found myself thinking about taking
my son through. " Oh, hell no. " The Rational Voice says, internally. I look in
to the black hole that is the entrance, and it feels something like a tomb. It's way too dangerous
to allow my children to enter. And as I wait The Rational Voice asks me, " if it's too
dangerous for them, what am I doing here? "
It's a good question, and one of the many questions that get asked and answered in Thunder Canyon
Cave, each time I go through.
After the epic rains of 2022/2023 we decided to explore the infamous
Thunder Canyon Cave. On several of our previous trips through when it's dry we were curious about the water that had sculpted these passages. Following the drainage down from its intersection with an
old road that leads to an abandoned ranch, we learned soon how the cave got its
name. The homesteads or ranch that is near the illusive cave lays on the edge of
a slope that drops down to the open desert leading out to the Salton Sea, and I
used to imagine that the discovery of the cave was made by children playing near
the ranch. We now know that it got its name because when it is in " peak flow "
the sound of the water flowing thunders up the canyon. Thunder
Canyon Cave has a reputation for being an extremely dangerous place. As I
descend the rope in to the cave, now roaring with water, mud splashes all over
my chest and my jacket gets caught in my rope. I am temporarily stuck hanging
over a pool of water of unknown depth about fifty feet below. It occurs to me
that my hands are getting cold and my that inner voice says calmy; "
you could die here. Don't mess up. "
Luckily, I am right over the lip of the first drop, within reach of my friend Bobby, who is going last through.
I am grateful to be close to him, that I can get an assist. I shine my headlight up and shout in as calm a voice as I could shout.
" Bobby, I got a situation here. "
He peers down, quickly asses the said situation and grabs my hand to pull me up, just enough, to unstick my jacket from the belay device. "
The Rational Voice is reprimanding; " What would have happened if he wasn't there? In my mind that ' what if ' plays out in a flash in my imagination: I would try and unstick my jacket from the device that provides friction as you descend the rope. This device, called a belay device, has sucked my rain jacket in to itself, in a death grip. As I do this, my hand would slip and I would to fall in to the dark abyss, bouncing off walls and landing in a pile of gore at the bottom of the vertical shaft.
All of this a very real possibility, if mistakes are made.
The part of my brain that is in a constant state of self analyzation, realizes that I don't feel fear, and it seems curious somehow, given the absurdity of the circumstances.
I unstick my jacket, but now there is a large hole in it, and as I descend down the rope on rappel the wet and muddy rope is being wrung out like a dirty rag, spraying my face and chest with gritty water. I leave my friend above. He will follow when I am off the rope.
At the bottom, the normally flat room is flooded with three feet of water and a six inch fountain of water is shooting out the wall and free falling twenty feet. It is surreal. This normally dry desert talus cave is exploding with rain water that has filtered down from the gullies and normally dry river beds.
My friend Michael has already plunged through the waterfall and I can hearing him shouting whoops of joy, so I go. I have trusted my friends with my life, literally. On El Capitan in Yosemite, other wild adventures like climbing San Diego famous local climbing routes like Meteor, in the dark, but, there has been nothing remotely close to what we are doing now, in terms of intensity. In terms of the unknowns and risks, it's way beyond what most climbing offers.
One of the realizations that I've made as an adult about some of these things, is that despite what the so-called Risk Takers and Adrenaline Junkies say about our own wild outings there comes a point in all these Adventures where you have to say to yourself, I might very well die here, but I'm going to do it anyway. I have that thought as I'm there, alone, now sixty feet underground looking at a wall of water I must pass through: " This is fucking insane. I might die. "
This voice is not shrill and panicked. It is the overtly calm and perhaps deadpan voice of the pilot of a 747 informing the passengers not to worry about that engine that has smoke trailing out behind the airplane.
I plunge through the water fall and begin the mad scramble that goes down, up and around dozens of twists and turns, some places I am doing moderate rock climbing, with no rope, others I am removing my tiny backpack to squeeze through almost impassable cracks and fissures, now thundering with surprisingly warm rain water.
All thoughts of staying dry are gone. I am instantly soaked and now its a race to the exit because to reverse our path now means to ascend a wet rope through a water spray sixty feet up. We have the equipment and experience to climb the rope, but its difficult, and so far the cave is passable and so we move as quickly as we can forward in to a wild and wet labyrinth.
At one point the four of us pause at another rope drop. This room is named The Cathedral Room and it is by far the largest internal space inside of Thunder Canyon perhaps 80 feet from the floor to the roof above. It is not lost on us that this roof is composed of giant sized granite boulders wedged in place by each other. Bobby brings up a filter, like an aquarium. He casually mentions that when a filter gets clogged it can suddenly become unclogged and release a giant amount of debris.
We then all visualize a flash flood inside of the cave and I at least, contemplate drowning.
I am third in line in a four party team. My primary climbing partner Michael and his girl friend Kelly are moving fast, now far enough down the winding path that I am alone waiting for Bobby to descend the wet rope from the entrance. I am at the end of a fifty foot corridor right before a sharp turn, far enough away from the others that for a moment it is both silent and, when I turn off my headlight , utterly pitch dark.
I wait in the cave, marveling at my surroundings and our passage roaring with water under my feet.
Instantly, The Rational Voice strikes up a conversation: " You know, this must be what the grave is like. In fact, this probably will be your grave. " Well, I answer, I certainly could be. I'm not gonna mess up. The mental chatter is quiet for a few moments. and then my friend catches up.
We go on, around, down.
In thinking about how to tell the story of Thunder Canyon Cave, I found it hard to explain the motivations to go repeatedly to a place that is well known to be extraordinarily dangerous. Yet, surely that must be part of the story. Why? Was I dropped on my head as a child?
As it turns out, yes I was.
In fact, in searching for a voice for this story I kept thinking about those of us who do dangerous sports for fun. It turns out that there are common things amongst risk takers. The primary pattern I noticed was that many of the people doing the most outrageous things, like climbing giant cliffs without ropes, have written about suffering depression and concussions. There seems to be a part of the brain that can get shut off when you suffer brain injury. The medical term is " slow brain bleed ", and the short description is that if you get dropped on your head, you can have a slow seepage of blood and fluid in the skull that does things like cause depression, kill normal fear reactions and make you have mild bi-polar like symptoms.
My buddies are all bold. We have shared many adventures, and all of us have been knocked unconscious at least once. I am NOT speaking for them or as to their motivations, all I know is that in 5th grade I cracked my head open in a snow sledding accident. I've always been a little edgy and have what some say is an unusual calm demeanor in high stress situations.
One of the things people say about Alex Honnold, the famous rock climber is that he's very robotic and I think, and again I cannot speak for him, but along with the ability to not feel normal fears, there's the ability to not feel normal things. This can can have complicating implication on a person's life and relationships.
People have inhabited the area
around McCain Valley, in the In-Ko Pah mountain for approximately 10,000 years,
but there is no way any of those ancient Americans would have been through these
passages, because Thunder Canyon is a climbers cave. On my first trip through, I
came across things I mistook for petrified wood. They look like thick tree
roots, but they are stone. Water has carved a path through this talus field and
made a real cave. Deep inside there is the cave equivalent of a summit register,
where mountaineers leave their names and date of ascent. The book is in a bottle
with a lid hanging from a string. At the time it was hard to imagine water in
the cave enough to make that book wet. I would come to find out later that no
parts of the cave would be safe from the water that literally thunders through
it after rainy years. Inside the register are names and dates of other people
who have passed through. My name is in there at least six times, and each time I
go through I feel the sense of an enormous passage of time. I also sense doom.
At the bottom of the cave there is often the remains of snakes and tarantulas
that get trapped in there. They are perhaps lured by the smell of water in the desert to
the eternal darkness where they die.
Thunder Canyon Cave is a tomb, but this time though the cave is flushed clean of all the bodies.
During summer trips to the cave we usually
go at night. The hike in is through a sandy trail, downhill going in and a long
uphill slog going out. At night the desert is teeming with insect and animal
activity, and inside Thunder Canyon Cave its the same: at night there are bats
and many more large spiders. We always go through in at least a group of three,
and if one of the party has never been through, they are usually asked to lead
the way, because its exciting for them and fun for us to watch the fear on their faces as they try and find the right way. There are now some painted arrows on the walls, placed there by the
rescue teams who have had to hoist hapless parties stuck deep inside. Even with
the arrows there are a plethora of dead ends and risky drops offs and leading
through, even after a half dozen times or more you have to be careful about not
going the wrong way. Going the wrong way just means going back to find the
correct way, not doom. " Unless you fall, or make a mistake at the wrong time ", The Rational Voice points out.
I imagine my headlight dying, and the voices of my friends getting farther away. In
some passages, if you were to botch the job of making your way through, and slip and fall, you might get
stuck in such a way as your body would not be retrievable. So, you don't fall.
Much like the movie Free Solo, where Alex Honnold is gripping the rock face and
facing certain death if one thing should go wrong, the passage through is that
stark: you CANNOT make a mistake. Yet mistakes happen, and The Voice describes in great detail in a mind movie the variety of ways I could die inside Thunder Canyon Cave.
We are moving fast. Normally we will spent two hours or more exploring the cave, but now we are just racing. Speed is safety, they say in the mountains. Haste also makes waste. I caution the team to keep their bodies away from the rock walls whenever possible because the rock leeches the warmth out of your body quickly. We pass the second rope drop, now in the largest room. It is a surreal scene. I am reminded of an absurd adventure scenario scene in a " B " movie, where everything is chaos all at once. There is a waterfall flowing from the cave wall. We must run through a drenching shower or turn back. Kelly is through the cave for the first time, she beung least experienced of the team at goimng through has a brief moment of concern when Bobby and I consult our maps. We are not lost, just trying to see on the map where the waterfall is marked. She mistakes our curiosity for confusion about which way to go and becomes visibly distressed.
This increases the sense of urgency and we increase the pace. The Rational Voice says, " You know, we don't know if she CAN climb back up this rope, through a mist of water, and if she losses her cool and starts to freak we are going to be stuck in here...forever. " That means we are now committed and must go forward. And we do. My imagination briefly plays out the scene of the four of us in there, forever. Our remains perhaps found many years later, perhaps not.
None of that happens. She performed remarkably well.
I realize what this is. This imagination is irrational fear.
Rational fear keeps you alive: it is wise to be afraid of falling from heights. It is not wise to imagine your equipment breaking or being stuck for ten thousand years. Irrational fear though, is what causes panic. The ability to separate rational fears from irrational fears is a byproduct of many years spent rock climbing. The rational fear is that if we are too slow or get stuck that we could all die of hyperthermia. The irrational fear is that we are lost inside the cave,
As I am moving towards the final and most dangerous passage, I am speaking calm words of encouragement to myself and anyone in earshot. Panic is contagious, and once given voice it can blossom like a poison flower. " We are almost out, " my friend tells her. " this is the last bit. All easy from here. " I absorb this too. I've been here before. Why?
He goes through. She goes through. Bobby who had pulled me up when my jacket was stuck goes in and I am alone again, about thirty five feet from the rest of our team
The final section is called " The Dread Chimney ".
Its been the scene of near fatal mishaps involving full on rescue. Its a twenty five foot section that starts about 18" wide and quickly pinches down to a slot so narrow that you cannot turn your head. My climbing helmet is a tight fit. You start in, then must invert sideways and slither across a wobbly wood plank. Twisting or getting your feet tangled will quickly have you stuck, exhausted and rapidly dying of hypothermia. It can be 110 degrees outside Thunder Canyon Cave, but the rock walls are about 73 degrees which brings death as mathematically certain as gash in the Titanic brought her sinking.
Before I start in I pass through the small back packs we carry that contain extra lights, food and extra vital equipment. If you are in a cave with one belay device, and you drop it, you will put yourself and your entire team in grave danger. So we pack redundancy: if you cannot survive without it bring two or three.
I pause and look back. The team is waiting for me, but I want to enjoy the absurdity of the moment, so I turn my headlight off and do the first half of The Dread Chimney in a darkness as deep as the grave. This has the desired effect and my heart races.
The darkness makes me feel something more like fear, what I think it is other people must feel, and I turn the light back on and execute the crux section without dying. " This time, " The Rational Voice says. " You get to live, this time. But maybe not the next time..."
We can now feel warmer air in the cave as we near the end, and the thundering sound of the water raging through the cave is more distant. We point these things out to our friend and she leaves her nervousness behind. In my imagination, I see myself down there with the other creatures who did not make it out. In the dark.
Previous trips through I noticed things I mistook for petrified wood in places coming out of the cave walls. How could tree roots be so deep inside the cave? Going through now the flooded cave the answer was revealed; the things I thought were ancient wood turned to stone were in fact the paths of the flowing water. The water leaves minerals on the rock where it flows so that, when old enough, it forms travertine flowstone that look like tree roots or branches.
On these previous trips I had given no thought as to why I did this. I was aware that I was asking myself, " why? ", but I never thought to answer.
We all look at Thunder Canyon Cave as a privilege. Yet, the reality is that doing this is inherently and seriously dangerous. Telling this story made me examine myself and my motivations and come to some truths. Part of what I learned was brought on by reading about other adventure athletes, people who climb without ropes, examining why they did it because I didn't understand why I do it. I learned that many of them eventually take one risk too many. Some fail to solve their problems by taking these risks, so they take their own lives. Most don't seem to have read about brain injuries and how they can re-wire the brain. How it may be these brain injuries that make our minds so full of dark mental chatter that sometimes, we obsess about the grave, or take risks that seem reckless to other ' normal ' people. I learned that I do these things that are really hard and dangerous because they make every day problems seem tame and simple. Not because I want to get hurt. But because the mental chatter is still there and it has to be tamed. The adrenaline is a strange reminder that we are alive and the near death experiences that come with things like Thunder Canyon Cave or rock climbing remind people with this problem that we really do want to live.
Thunder Canyon Cave makes us feel alive and charged with energy. Despite the many twists and turns inside the cave you exit very close to where you start. The same question at the end as it was at the beginning: " Why am I here ? "
Now at least, we know how it got its name.
I have not been back since then. There is a sense that I can never top that experience. Not in climbing or caving.
Exploring the labyrinths of my mind further might be the best reason to go back.
DISCLAIMER
If one tries to
research about Thunder Canyon cave, all they will find is horror stories about
people getting stuck. There is the very real possibility that getting stuck or
even slightly injured will mean death. I would say that the vast majority of
people entering Thunder Canyon Cave are unqualified to be there. Meaning they
would be unable to reverse course should they be unable or unwilling to go
forward. To reverse your path through the cave means you must have the equipment
and experience to climb a rope up vertical shafts. Any mention of this place
must come with a strongly worded warning: Thunder Canyon Cave is a technical
cave, not meant for hikers or tourists. Entering the cave comes with extreme
risk in the best of conditions. It involves sections where you must rappel down
a rope, where mistakes can easily cost you your life and accidents put your
entire team in danger. Rescue will be hours away, and if you are stuck in there,
you likely will die of hypothermia before help can come. There are multiple ways
in to and out of Thunder Canyon Cave, and its rude to ask where it is. You have
to be invited. Searching online for Thunder Canyon Cave yields only stories of
near death experiences by people who have been rescued. Its not that the caving
community is territorial, like surfers are said to be, its that we want access
protected, so we discourage inexperienced climbers from going in there and
regularly pack out any trash we find.
This publication and the author disavow any mishaps you may bring upon yourselves or your friends.
DO NOT ENTER THUNDER CANYON CAVE
