The Saga of the Owl Hole Laddder

 
   Owl Hole, Grand Bahama, is a classic example of a limestone sinkhole- it’s rough circle of an entrance, with a diameter of approx. 50 feet, slopes off  under your feet.  Thirty feet down the water surface is reached; sixty feet deeper the cave floor.   Rocks, which once formed the roof to this section of the Old Freetown cave system, form a large pile, or debris cone, reaching back up to within fifteen feet of the surface.  The early cave explorers reached the water by rappelling (ab-sailing) down from the lip, their anchor points can still be seen drilled into the bedrock.  I arrived on the scene shortly after Ben Rose’s 60 foot long aluminium ladder had been stolen after being left out near the cave entrance overnight.   This was back in 1994, and as a newly certified cavern diver- who had just spent his life savings on the contents of the dive-rite catalogue- I was desperate to get down into that cave.  My two intrepid ‘cave diving’ buddies, Eric Pedersen and Steve Lombardi, and I were sure that if we could just do a few dives from the Owl Hole side we could link up with our rather aimless ramblings from Mermaid’s Lair, and thus complete what was, to us, the almost mythical traverse-even though none of us were actually cave certified at the time, and had very little idea of how this may be achieved.  Luckily, we had neither the equipment nor the expertise to attempt rappelling, so our cave diving adventures were limited to clueless forays in Mermaid’s Lair, after our days work at the nearby Underwater Explorer’s Society (UNEXSO) was done.  After learning the hard way what a T is, and what a good idea it is to mark the exit side, and finally realizing that we were swimming in circles and advancing no farther from Mermaid’s, Eric and I took the plunge and enrolled in a Technical Cave course with Tony Satterfield over in Florida (still the greatest dive course I’ve ever taken).  Somehow, I managed to persuade UNEXSO that it was in their best interests to construct a permanent steel ladder down into the hole.  They provided the steel, Steve welded it together, and we got ready to pop it into place.  The Season arrived, planning a decompression cave dive as our third or fourth dive of the day seemed less attractive, and Eric and I were busy getting slightly less disoriented from the Mermaid’s Lair side when we did have the time. Steve left the island.  Eric left the island.  I discovered the ladder was really heavy, and no one really wanted to help me carry it.     I also eventually left the island having never seen the ladder in place. 
I visited the island once, I think it was 1999, with Kate Lewis and Steve Serras. The ladder was in limbo, having been installed briefly, then removed as a potential hazard to the Owls that frequent the sinkhole. We had an enjoyable week of cave diving from the Mermaid's Lair side, and off the beach in 'Chimney Hole', but still no Owl Hole for me. Upon moving back to the island in 2003 to manage the Xanadu Undersea Adventures dive shop, imagine my delight to find the ladder back in place! Cristina Zenato had dropped it back in as soon as the Owlcentric political wrangle had been straightened out.

I finally got to dive the place, and what a place! The hole gets wider the deeper you go, until at the bottom it has a diameter of approx. 150 feet, the views up from here are stunning, there is a great halocline at 40feet, and 3 huge cave tunnels lead off into thousands of feet of cave. Everything went great, 10 dives later I finally made the traverse from Mermaid's to Owl's, I was able to use the cave in my courses, as it claimed one of the few undecorated passages on the island, which was ideal for more 'high-impact' training drills. Then, around June 2006, along came Kevin Jones to finish his cave course. Kevin and I had known each other for a while through Chip Earle's SeaDevils scuba club, and the course went off to a great start. Kevin had been lucky enough to have a really thorough Cavern instructor, and had put a lot of thought into preparing for the course. Anyway, to cut a long story slightly, Kevin was making his way down the ladder with twin alu. 80's on his back when one of the rungs gave way. Luckily, barring a few bruises, no serious damage was done, but it showed those boffins were right, steel does rust in water after all!

Obviously, something needed to be done, we needed a new ladder. First of all, Steve Robinson, my Dad, and I went out there one evening to winch the old ladder out, inspect for damage and make a plan. We decidied that there wasn't enough good steel left to effect repairs, so a brand new ladder would be needed. I left the island in September 2006, moving to Miami with wife and family, so Steve was left to finish the job himself. He has done a magnificent job, and 2 weeks ago, on the 26th May, the new ladder was installed with the help of Steve's mate Billy. The new ladder is made from a higher grade marine steel, and has been designed to allow retro-fitting of a platform to it's base; to remove it from the water, lightening it's weight, and prolonging it's life.
The next step could well be installing a 'kermantile' guide line along the traverse, cleaning up this section to convert some of those T's into jumps. Keep posted for details.