Caves - The World Beneath Our World

7/23/2019 Caves - The World Beneath Our World

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If you are stretched and squeezed by everyday life, then you

might be in perfect shape to explore caves.

Enter a narrow natural passageway that may lead to simplymind-boggling underground world. Caves may lur right

under your feet! a fascinating and unexpected environment,

which is often nown only to speluners and dedicated

"ollum-seeers


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Back to the Cave!


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#$ymphony of $tones# %how aptly named&


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'airyland Cave 'ormations

Caves are a fairyland of delight, from the burning hot enclaves

to the glacial ice mazes. (housands of years of dripping water,

eroding stone and budding minerals create a silent world of

mystery and beauty... "raceful arches, giant crystals... silent

but for the sound of water dripping and bubbling through.


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(he most common type of caves form when slightly acidic

rainwater tricles into the crevices of limestone and gradually

widens the cracs as it dissolves the stone. Centuries of water,

supersaturated with minerals, dripping from cave roofs cause

stalagmites and stalactites to form.


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)ne thing to eep in mind during cave exploration! though

these structures are made of minerals, they are generally

extremely thin and fragile, many of them are quite rare, and

can be damaged or destroyed by touch alone. Calcite %the

mineral which forms many cave structures&, for example, is

soft enough to be scratched by a fingernail.


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$ome of the cave and roc

formations!

- 'lowstone %also nown as a

*acon formation&

- Cave +earls

- $oda $traws

- elictites

- nthodites %or ragonite&

- *ottlebrush formation


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+robably the most comprehensive cave-exploration site on the

net is that of ave *unnell... /ou can spend hours there,

wandering around pages, cataloging whimsical underground

structures, oozing roc and dripping stone.


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0argest Cave $ystems

1e mentioned the 2eita "rotto - the largest cave system in the

3iddle East- in our recent 0ebanon article. (he longest nown

stalactite in the world is found there at 4.5 meters long.

- (he deepest nown cave is 6oronya Cave in bhazia,"eorgia and has been explored to a depth of 5787 meters.

- (he longest continuous cave system yet explored is 3ammoth

Cave in 9entucy, covering :87 ilometers.


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0et;s have a short world tour of the most interesting caves, why

don;t we< 1e;ll start with =orth merica -

lready mentioned 0uray Caverns in 6irginia are full of

celebrated speleothems formations, calcite crystals of

abnormal shapes - all formed when the chambers werecompletely filled with water, highly charged with acid. (he acid

began to eat away the softer material, resulting in ornate

pinnacles and arches...


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)ne of the deepest

nown cave pits,

'antastic +it in

"eorgia;s Ellison;s

Cave descends :4>

feet %7?8 meters& ina straight tunnel!


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"lacial Caves and Ice Caverns

$ome ice caves must rather be called #glacier caves#, which

can simply astound with the intensity of ice color!


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ere is a wonderful page of ice caves photography by

2ason "ulley!


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=o sign of $uperman or 3egatron there yet!


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lot of ice caves grow

#hair# - ice extrusions,some are quite strange-

looing

* il C t lli @ d d 1 t


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*razil! Crystalline @nderground 1aters

3ato "rosso do $ul region in *razil %and especially the quiet

town of *onito& boasts many marvelous underground laes!

"ruta do 0ago zul, "ruta do 3imoso, quArio =atural.

Intricate limestone formations and grottos hide the intensely-colored pools and waterfalls %many adventure tours there

feature diving, some pools are more than 7BB meters deep&!


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0imestone caves in the same region offer fantastic exploration!


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6 l C f th "h t


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6enezuela! Cave of the "host

Cueva del 'antasma is big enough for two helicopters to fly into

it, but it;s not technically a cave - rather, a collapsed gorge. It

does, however, sport a huge waterfall right inside of it!

Iran tremendo s ca e s stem


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Iran! tremendous cave system

9atale 9hor is a cave dating bac to the 2urassic period. It;s

one of the #snow caves# in the $outhwest anDan province and

connects to other caves - a huge underground infra-structure

which can hide who nows what %definitely anti-merican...win win&. $ee more pictures here.


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6ietnam! ang (hien Cung cave


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6ietnam! ang (hien Cung cave

(here are plenty of caves in 6ietnam, and Dust lie in China,

many are illuminated with garish colors. %see here&. *ut

sometimes even artificial light taes bac stage to the incredible

roc textures!

3exico! "iant $elenite Crystals


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3exico! "iant $elenite Crystals

In 5BBB, one of the most unusual and splendid caves was found

in 3exico by miners. 0ocated only a mile from an upthrust of

magma, this cave is 775 degrees 'arenheit and at 8B-7BBF

humidity, limiting greatly the amount of time explorers canspend in it. It is a spectacular cave, with gigantic crystal

formations thought to be >BB,BBB years old.


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(he crystals formed underwaterG as water saturated with


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(he crystals formed underwaterG as water saturated withcalcium sulfate heated in the cavern selenite molecules

crystallized and grew, undisturbed, to giant proportions. (he

cave was drained %by unnowing miners& in the 784B;s and

stopped the process of growth. 1ho nows what we may findfurther on, in the heat and water

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Caves - The World Beneath Our World