A poll taken the night before showed most divers would rather do two different caves instead of two dives at Tux Kubaxa. I was in favour of two different systems, mostly because I'd done Tux Kubaxa several times before and didn't see getting two dives with enough variation to keep it interesting. However I loved Jim's answer to her poll most: "I just wanna dive." Connie suggested Minotauro for the afternoon dive which was immediately met with enthusiastic approval.
On to the cave dive report!
Tux Kubaxa
Mosquitoes were particularly bad at this site, as I expected. In anticipation of this, I had taken off my T-shirt back in the hotel room and sprayed the back of it with Ben's 100 DEET, as well as hitting my legs and arms thoroughly with the stuff. Compulsive application paid off for me, but everyone else on the tour were madly swatting skeeters as soon as they got out of the van.One of the feature attractions of Tux Kubaxa are piles of prehistoric animal bones, in varying states of completeness and condition. I'd seen the mastodon bones every other trip so I was hoping to do something different. Fortunately, my dive partner Sandra was up for splitting off from the main group, and I wanted to see the sloth bones found in another passage. We made a team of 2 and were last into the cave system. Sandra ran reels because she'd been there before. So... Left at the "T" intersection, then two righthand jumps just past the first cenote we encountered (beautiful azure light streaming through a large breakdown area) and a mere 200 feet later through surprisingly small (for Tux Kubaxa) and HIGHLY decorated passageway and there was the pile of sloth bones! They seemed rather big for a sloth, at least judging by the vertebrae. Or maybe it's that "Objects appear closer in water than they actually are" phenomenon. I tried to see a jawbone or skull but it looked like those could have been removed. All the ribs, vertebrae and other bits seemed to be there though. I hear rumors that cave divers are becoming more brazen about taking "trophies" from caves for their personal museums and mantles. What was funny about the sloth bone site is that I did not see any of the Mexican INAH preservation/identifier cones.
The passageway was so entrancingly beautiful! After gawking at the bones for several minutes I checked my time (52 minutes) and air (300 psi above turn point) and showed Sandra my gauge, with a question as to whether we could continue down the line. She indicated she was cold (her semi-drysuit had been leaking progressively worse as the week went on) so we turned the dive and were out of the cave again at exactly 100 minutes. I *loved* the tour and these new passageways are another place I will have to take my camera with a wide-angle lens. And lots of strobe power.
Minotauro
This cave is often on Connie's tour weeks because it has a little bit of everything: halocline, restrictions, speleothems, breakdown rooms, solution cave,... everything except big rooms. The first 10 minutes of passageway you traverse from the cenote are a nightmare for anyone who doesn't have their buoyancy down to experienced cave diver standards. Or any cave diver who might get claustrophobic. If it's not narrow vertically, then it bends or squeezes horizontally.Minotauro's main line is a circuit, ending back on itself pretty much where that narrow entrance passage ends. Connie likes to close the gap to complete the circuit, then proceed on the main line counter-clockwise. There are many side passages that radiate outwards from the circle made by the main line. Connie's team of 5 divers went ahead of ours but took a different jump to cenote Escalera which was before our jump to cenote Estrella. Because of this, our team entered the deeper part of the cave with the halocline first. As 3rd diver on the team I didn't get the best view of the halocline, but in some of the wider sections I was able to move a bit left or right of the other divers' wake and get the full effect. As a test, I pulled out my Dive Rite LED 500 lumen alternate primary to see the difference of colour temperature between LED and HID. (I had Sandra's 21 Watt Sartek HID for this dive.) Hands down, the HID pierces both fresh and salt water better, and the HID renders prettier (truer?) colours in the salt water layer. LED's still have a way to go before I will want to replace my HID primary.
About 200-300 feet before one reaches cenote Estrella, there is a bedding plane restriction that is a mere 18-20 inches tall and maybe 30 feet long. It is not difficult for an average sized diver in back-mounted doubles to negotiate. But it does take patience, proper trim, good technique and shallow breaths! It's probably a good place for a valve roll-off too, if you're not paying attention to your tanks. On my way to Estrella I tried to do a clever sideways traverse thru the bedding plane. That sort of worked but it wasn't smooth. On my way back, I paid much more attention to where the plane seemed thickest. I was lining myself up both mentally and physically, by stretching my arms out in front of me and dropping my heels. Then I start hearing someone singing the Mighty Mouse theme! It was Jim, right behind me commenting on my simulated-Superman pose.
Anyway, the way back was easier, and it wasn't long before we were back on the main line looking at the white mouse, the black mouse and the plastic skeleton that one of Connie's group members from years ago left on a stalagmite. (If you don't know what I'm talking about, don't worry about it.)
Total time in Minotauro: 84 minutes not including the minutes spent relaxing in cenonte Estrella. Water temperature: 77 degrees F.
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