Lost Fiesta Cavern [aka: WB Ice Cave] - (Caving Part 2)

We used to rock climb occasionally at a small Sandstone crag located in the Dunbar Mountains, on the opposite side of the "Morgan Run Hollow" (as I was corrected) from Kraylick Rocks. Around January 1995 a buddy (Ken Welsh) and I were out winter hiking in the area, and had stopped to take a break at the main "wall" - is tall (for SWPA, maybe 40ft), broken and severely overhanging - never really messed around on it for obvious reasons. While hanging around, we hear a lot of water dripping/flowing, and find that the sound is coming from inside the wall...?  We investigate several horizontal cracks and fissures in the wall face, and sure enough, there's water draining behind the wall into what appears to be a large chamber, judging from the reverb. We found a crawl opening at the base of the wall - however, it was too small to squeeze through at the time. We decided to return the following week with some digging tools.

We're back the following Saturday with tools and lights and some help. A bit of digging to widen the crawl, and we're in. Found a large chamber, and it was pretty cool - water flowing through cracks in the ceiling had formed a line of dangling ice daggers, at most maybe 5 to 8 feet in length, with a solid ice column from ceiling to floor, maybe 25ft in height, located at the south end of the chamber. The floor was also a sheet of thick ice  We were pretty stoked. The following visit we discovered another entrance, this one through a short climb and crawl accessed from a large 'shelter' formed at the north inside corner of the wall. This led to an "upper tier" that also formed a small ledge that ran the length of the back wall. This access must also have been the entrance for many critters - we found several large nests and piles of assorted nutshells. Visits in warmer months also revealed many 'cave crickets' and large spiders. There is also some type of miniature blue and purple mushrooms which grow on the walls. Through the years we also found that the cave functions as a natural freezer - we have found ice, particularly on the floor, well into late April (extra cold winter, naturally). Pretty nice.

As far as we know, the place had been unknown. Rob (Goodman) inquired into the local caving 'grotto', of which he and a few other buddies were members, and they had no knowledge of the place. Coincidentally, at the time the grotto had just published a book on all the known SWPA sandstone caves and shelters - no mention there. Rob stated that the find was probably the largest sandstone cave discovery yet - just saying....

....heres a shot of the exterior wall. That's Ken (Welsh) added for scale - he's standing in front of the "dug crawl", just after completion. Ken's another local hardcore guy who is always an asset to have along. Note the horizontal cracks in the rock bedding. The interior chamber pretty much runs the length of the wall....

...here's the location. Park at the new PA State Gameland parking area, just over the new bridge over Morgan Run (just past the iron furnace). Take the logging trail opposite the parking area uphill for a about 0.35 miles - a short bushwack due east thru the woods will put you right on top the cliff...

...here's a map of the cave itself. Is not to scale. Total length of the room is estimated at around 70 feet...

... that's Bill (Fiesta) sitting at the entrance to the 'shelter'. We hiked up there last Sunday with the intent to get some interior photos for this post. All the many visits there over the years, and other than shooting a bit of video, had never taken any "stills" from inside. None this day either - the entrance to the crawl from inside the shelter was blocked by a thick curtain of ice. We didn't bring any tools to bust through, either - wasn't anticipated - never encountered that before...

... here's Bill and the interior of the shelter. The floor was solid ice, as well. I'll bet the cave itself is currently formed pretty nice, considering this photo. Will update this post with some additional photos if  we make it back up there in the near future...

... lastly (is that a word?), here's an old photo depicting some of the rock climbing conditions on the surrounding walls and boulders.  The area has some pretty decent climbing.