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Wolf River Cave

Trip Report, August 21st, 1999

Saturday, August 21st, 1999, Bill and Chris Walter, Jason, and Ed from the Spencer Mountain Grotto, Greg King and myself from the Upper Cumberland Grotto, and Gabby Call and Tara Thompson from the Tennessee Chapter of the Nature Conservancy all meeting at the Huddle House in Cookeville, Tennessee. This trip was the first visit to the cave after the circulation and signing of the cave managment plan between the landowner's of the cave, the Tennessee Chapter of the Nature Conservancy, and the Upper Cumberland Grotto. We all got in our trucks and made a caravan up into Fentress County.

We arrived at Wolf River Cave just before 12:00 noon. A rather large group of local cavers was exiting the cave as we arrived. We all suited up and entered the cave. Greg pointed out a side passage with some rimstone pools in it so we went to have a look. Gabby found a cave crawfish in one of the pools that still held water in this dry August of 1999. We proceeded through the cave and saw very little evidence of trash or vandalism. That is a comforting and refreshing change.

Our goal for the day was to reach the Enchanted Forest. This is an area about two miles into the cave that is profusely decorated. The trip to the Enchanted Forest is a bit challenging though not difficult. The trip offers a bit of everything. There is deep, gooey mud, there are several climbs up and down breakdown, and there are a couple of traverses and narrow ledges. There is even a good, long crawl, know as "The Only Crawl.". The trip to Enchanted Forest is, in general, a nice, challenging tourist trip.

When we reached our destination Greg and I sat down and relaxed and ate our lunches while the rest of the group set out to explore the approximately 300 feet of highly decorated passage. I joined the group and began shooting photos in the "forest" after I finished my lunch. The Enchanted Forest contains a huge column, many, many stalactites of various colors and enough soda straws to get a drink out of. There are large rimstone dams and shelves and interesting helectites too. Everyone that saw the decorations felt pretty enchanted it seemed. Probably a good name for the area.

We routed the cave after our lunch among the decorations. Bill found an interesting crawl-down (go-figure!) on the way out that bypassed some breakdown, and crossed possibly virgin cave for a few feet. We all tried the new bypass. The rest of the trip out was fairly uneventful except for the big mud hole that we had to slide into and then cross near the entrance.

We exited the cave after about 5 hours and 45 minutes underground. We all escaped injury-free except for a few bruises on a couple of us. We found the smiling face of Steve MacDonnell waiting for us at the entrance. He had showed up late at the entrance, found some Yahoos hanging around the trucks and decided to truck-sit for us till we got out. Thanks Steve! He also found the upper entrance to the cave while he was poking around in the woods nearby.

A successful and fun trip for all. Thanks go out to Greg King and Bill Walter for leading this trip and to the Land Owners for not closing the cave. The photos on this page were all from this trip.

Go to Wolf River Cave page One.

Go to Wolf River Cave page two featuring an NSS article about the cave.

SCCi's Wolf River Cave Preserve Page

Photos