THE PIT – SISTEMA DOS OJOS
Sunday, July 30th, 2006
Dennis Weeks of PAALMU asked me a week earlier if I could take him to the famous Cenote “THE PIT”. It is located approximately 10,000 feet from Cenote DOS OJOS EAT underwater. It is inaccessible by land unless you have a super tough 4-wheel vehicle. There is no longer any ladder to climb down into the water which is a 30 foot sheer drop. It has been over a year and a half since I was there last with a total of five DPV dives to this incredible geological wonder.
Dennis owns a SUBMERGE AV26 DPV and I own four. We planned the dive with two DPV’s apiece, double steel 104’s tanks on our backs and two aluminum 80 cu. ft. stage bottles each. We arrived to Cenote Dos Ojos on Sunday morning around 9:15 a.m. and luckily not many divers had arrived as usually this popular dive site is a complete zoo. GUE Instructor Christophe Le Malliot was already there taking his wife – Marlene and another diver on a cavern dive(s). Half of the work for this dive is hauling all the gear down to the water from where we parked Dennis’s truck. Luckily, I bought my two-wheel hand cart and that helped a great deal.
For the dive, we discussed the strategy and what to expect. We would breathe the first stage bottle all the way to Cenote Tikim Ich with an air dome halfway between. It usually takes about 20 minutes to motor to the air dome from Cenote Dos Ojos East. We did it in 19 minutes and that set the pace and proved to me that Dennis was a natural with using the SUBMERGE DPV’s. We made it to Cenote Tikim Ich in another 15 minutes for a total of 37 minutes, 35 minutes using the first DPV’s. We dropped and clipped off our first stage bottle at this cenote. However, we continue further with the first DPV’s for another five minutes for a total 40 minute burn time. We stopped; clipped off the first DPV’s making sure we locked the trigger handles. For the next 400 feet the cave passage is low with halocline but then turns into a big room passage. It is here that I expected the first booby trap, the line cut back to hide the way to THE PIT. This hiding lines mentality is something I do not understand, however, as with the wide variety of cave diving philosophies and attitudes; it is part of the territory. I had warned Dennis about these potential “booby traps” and I brought the appropriate reels to deal with them. I tied off on a stalagmite where the guideline and already been cut and tied back together. Dennis installed appropriate line arrows pointing back to Cenote Tikim Ich. I quickly motored about 60 feet across the room and found the appropriate line to continue our journey to “THE PIT”. For the next 600 feet the cave passage is more like canyon features. I was now ready for the next booby trap and sure enough the line has been cut back hiding the correct way to “THE PIT”. I was pretty much annoyed with these inconveniences but I have learned to deal with the aggravation.
The next 700 feet is bedding plane passage where swimming with the DPV is necessary in some locations. If you are really good with the machines, you can motor without hurting the cave. Both Dennis and I had no problems maneuvering the SUBMERGE DPV’s. There was one point where we stopped as I suspected a third “booby trap” in the bedding plane area. However, I finally realized everything was fine as this was the location I had to fix a booby trap from a previous dive with Sergio Granucci. Then the cave passage drops 15 feet in depth and for next 1800 feet you are “motoring” gorgeous, beautiful cave passage with plenty of room to control the DPV’s. We stopped and disengaged our second stage bottles before we negotiated the last 600 feet as it is shallow, small passages. At certain places it requires swimming the DPV’s, however much of the way you can “motor” with skill to get to ‘the PIT’. Usually, it takes about 80 – 85 minutes to get to THE PIT from the CENOTE DOS OJOS EAST. Today, because of the booby traps it took us over 105 minutes to “motor” to our target.
I was in the lead when I saw the beautiful daylight filtering down from the heavens into the CENOTE THE PIT. I stopped my machine and allowed Dennis to catch up and hover next to me. I gestured to cover our primary 10 watt HID lights. I could sense that Dennis was in total exhilaration as he viewed the incredible sight of the size and beauty of THE PIT. This cenote is definitely the BEST of the BEST!
I think of the original explorers and discoverers of THE PIT – Dan Lins of Lake City, Florida and Kay Pozda Walten of Akumal. It took some mighty fine exploring to find this awesome place. It is something they should be very proud of.
We motored out from the balcony view and used our SUBMERGE DPV’s to take us along the walls of the cenote at 40 feet. The massive size of this goliath collapse made your eyes bulge in disbelief. I signaled to Dennis to surface as I wanted to verbally review our next planned phase of this dive. Soon as we were at the surface, Dennis was bubbling with sheer excitement of what he had already seen and experienced. He was definitely a “kid” in a candy shop. Our next segment of our dive was to spiral downward into the upstream portion of this cave. I have legally dived Wakulla Springs in Florida 8 times during the 1980’s. This next part of our dive beats Wakulla (in my opinion). I warned Dennis to prepare himself as the dive was going to get MUCH better. He looked at me as if I were a fool telling him a lie. No lie as the descent into the giant is beyond words of description. With the SUBMERGE DPV machines we had, we could actually quadruple our distance compared to normal swimming. What a great concept! We descended circling the cenote walls making sure we watched ourselves as the depths increased. We had previously discussed prior to the dive that we would go with the flow in how we felt physically, emotionally and physiologically. I was mighty fine and Dennis responded with a positive OK. We followed the white exploration line about 375 feet upstream to a depth of 210 feet, a point where it was obvious the cave was going to go much deeper as I realized there is a mega size room called The WAKULLA ROOM” further ahead. We had plenty of gas in our 104’s and we made two circles in this portion of the cave passage as it really appeared more like a huge room or known and named “THE CARDEA PASSAGE”.
Finally, we knew we reached the point of the dive where we must start heading home. We called the dive signaling each other with a big “thumbs up” hand signal. We spiraled our way along the walls as we ascended back to the 40 foot passage to take us back to our stage bottles, our second pony and back to Cenote DOS OJOS EAST.
The return dive was flawless ad I watched Dennis do an outstanding job controlling his machine. We left both “booby trap” areas as continuous guide line and clearly marked. The dive was nearly four hours underwater. Afterward, we stopped in Chemuyil for the traditional post dive pizza and refreshments at the famous LEO’s pizza restaurant celebrating our enjoyable dive.
The following Sunday, August 6th I repeated the same dive with Alex Alvarez who owns and operates the AQUATIC TULUM dive store located in Tulum on the southeast corner of the intersection of Highway 307 and the Coba Road. Alex has been to the Cenote THE PIT before but he asked me to take him as he wanted to reacquaint himself with the route. With no “booby traps” or other annoying delays we were able to reach THE PIT in 75 minutes. What a complete difference! This dive we did not go quite as far as into the CARDEA PASSAGE as I done the week before with Dennis Weeks. Alex’s DPV skills are excellent as he own both a SUBMERGE AV 26 and a GAVIN DPV. Locally, I now have five cave diving friends who own SUBMERGE DPV’s and/or are skillful with the machines that I can dive with. They are Alex Alvarez, Sergio Granucci, Harry Gust, Rogelio Mier and Dennis Weeks. Next month, Paul Heinerth of Hudson, Florida is to fly down and do a few DPV dives with me to THE BLUE ABYSS in Sistema NOHOCH NAH CHICH and THE PIT & LSD areas of Sistema DOS OJOS, and sections of Sistema OX BEL HA including YAX CHEN.