Los Chorros Part 2

We came to a spot where the water was chest high and we had to dip under the rock. The water was a little high and to continue required going into a sump and the leader thought the space on the other side would be full of water. We had lunch and then were headed back the way we came.

There were a lot of bats in this cave. This seemed odd since we usually see bats in dry caves or drier areas anyway. There were so many that when our lights disturbed them some were falling into the water, doing a little "bat paddle" and flying back up. In a dry cave when bats fall they cannot fly up from the ground - in the water they just paddle a little and fly up! I don't know what the relationship of these bats was (mother-child, husband-wife, just dating) but one seemed to be shielding the other. Their faces were pretty cute.

We navigated some narrow spots but they were high vertically.

I don't know what these formations are but I call them the ice-cream fountain formations.

When we were near where we came in a few folks left and some of us decided to continue through a side passage and this is where it got really interesting.Manuel had been down this part before. It was very narrow and really cool.

Then it opened up a lot.

Then it constricted some more and we got to this little hole you could climb through or you could go under. Bro contemplated climbing and decided to go under. I prefer wiggling into tiny spots and went through it. A few of us continued and a few stayed back (you guessed it - Jeff didn't want to do it). Finally we ended up floating in a small spot looking at another sump. Manuel thought it would be full of water so we didn't continue.

Here he is popping back up after having gone under. I don't have a problem when it is a short little sump in clear water. We noticed another side shoot that Manuel hadn't been down. We headed straight for it..the thrill of discovery.

The terrain started looking different

The formations looked like fudgesicles. It looks like the stalactites are covered with mud or something but they aren't - the rock or minerals or whatever are a chocolaty cocoa brown. Then the unexpected happened - saw some light and we went to it. We looked out onto the road we came in on above the waterfall. We continued the other way and it led to a very large dry cave that had a lot of guano and lots of bats in it.

There were two Puerto Rican Boa Constrictors eating bats on the floor. (see the little bat wing popping up?) This room was huge and dry which was interesting. It didn't even seem like the same cave. Well, we continued on after this great discovery and it led back to the original tunnel. This cave was like 3 caves in one - a dry cave, a Zumbo area, and another dark cocoa area. This was a lot of fun and a lot of variety. As always it was a nice group of people and was a little exercise. It had so many different areas in it it was like a new discovery at every turn!