vituperation

January 5, 2003

Last night I dreamed I went to see the latest Lord of the Rings movie. At one point I went to get popcorn and wander around the lobby for a bit. When I came back everyone in the theater was dead.

I can only assume it was the boredom that got them.

Yesterday was gorgeous, with clear blue skies and brilliant sun shining everywhere. It was cold early on, but by about ten it was nearly forty degrees out, with a high of close to fifty predicted. In other words, it was a perfect day to hit Montesano mountain and look for one of the geocaches I’d been unable to find the last time I was up there.

When I got home from that particular trip I read the logs for the two caches I’d missed and found that one of them - the Waterline Amphitheater cache - seemed to have bad coordinates. This time, I stored both the listed coordinates for the cache and a set of alternates that others had had luck using. I packed up my backpack and headed for the Land Trust parking lot.

Once there, I got out my map of the trails and decided to take a roundabout trip to the cache since it was early and I was feeling peppy. My course would take me the entire length of the Alms House Trail, which I’d never done (I’ve been on the first half-mile or so plenty of times, but never to the end of the trail), then up the Waterline Trail to Dry Falls. If you recall from my last trip (linked earlier), Dry Falls is where the notorious "difficult hiking" section is, and this time I was approaching from below, which would force me to climb the toughest tenth of a mile I’d been on yet. From the Dry Falls I’d continue up to the High Trail which would bring me along the mountaintop back to the Jeep for a total of four or five miles.

I couldn’t wait.

At the end of the Alms House trail, where the Waterline Trail begins, there’s a piece of Huntsville History called "Three Caves", something I’d never seen in my twenty-one years of living here. Back in the 1940’s, the Madison Limestone Company began digging into the side of Montesano mountain for the bounty of limestone it contained. North Alabama is loaded with the stuff (the next county over from me is actually named Limestone County), which is used extensively in construction. As the company dug into the mountain it created three entrances to the mine, which looked like cave openings and ultimately gave the name.

In 1952 the mining company closed down for a couple of reasons. First, operating costs were skyrocketing; open-pit mining was much more cost effective for limestone than digging into the mountainside. Second, the mines were located right in the middle of a residential area and the neighbors were getting tired of the dynamite blasting going on all the time.

Ten years later, during the Cuban missile crisis, Three Caves was designated a nuclear fallout shelter for the area and the National Guard was sent in to clean it up. Plans were made to store food there, but that was never done because the imminent threat of nuclear war diminished. In the late 1970’s a terribly cheesy post-apocalypic movie called Ravagers (with Richard Harris and Art Carney) was filmed at Three Caves. Some 350 Huntsvillians were cast as extras.

In 1989 the Three Caves site was given to the Land Trust, who’ve maintained it ever since. As I mentioned, I’d never seen Three Caves and didn’t quite know what to expect. All I can say is that pictures don’t do it justice - it was well worth the hike all the way down Alms House trail to see.

Near the end of the Alms House Trail, looking down at two
of the cave entrances. The third entrance is below where
I’m standing.

One of the cave entrances (the center one), from up close.

In front of the caves, looking up at the bluff I’d just been standing on.
Unfortunately, climbing and rappelling are forbidden. Just to the left of bottom
center, the third entrance is visible.

Standing in the center entrance, looking in. For reference, the opening is
about twelve feet tall, and inside things open to twenty or thirty feet high.

A rock wall. In the background can be seen one of the immense limestone
support columns left in place by the mining company to prevent
cave-ins.

Looking at one of the entrances from within. You can see a pinch
of another entrance on the left side of the picture. That’s another
of those columns between them.

The caves go pretty far back. Had I known I’d actually be able to
enter the caves I’d have brought a light. It was so dark in there that I
didn’t realize there was a wall at the back of the shaft pictured; to
the naked eye it was pitch black. Gamma correction in Photoshop rocks,
because straight out of the camera this picture was nothing but black.

Water runs down many of the columns in Three Caves and drips
from the ceiling in numerous places;in a few millennia stalagmites and
stalactites will form, like in natural caves.

After leaving Three Caves I headed up the Waterline Trail, which is incredible because the whole trail - maybe .6 miles - is uphill, and is wickedly steep in some parts.

Coming up on Dry Falls from below. Note the icicles and wet ice
in the bottom section, which made the climbing much more fun.

I found the cache easily with the alternate coordinates.

After trading some Valentine’s Day mini-candles I’d found in a junk drawer for a pocket hand warmer, I made my way slowly up the "difficult hiking" section and to the top of Waterline Trail, where it joins Bluffline Trail. One thing I’d like to mention about the "difficult section" that I forgot to mention last time - and this might give you a better idea of how steep it is - is that the trees there have eyescrews in them, so you can attach carabiners and ropes if you have them.

It’s steep. Damn steep. And it was muddy again yesterday, which made it even better.

I followed the Bluffline Trail to the High Trail and went up to the top of the mountain. Along the way I stopped and ate lunch on a nice flat rock, then made my way back to the Jeep and came home.