Midnight Cave EarthCache

This cache has been archived.

KoosKoos: Too much trouble to try to make this one conform to the new logging requirements for Earthcaches as it's not an interactive site, so I'm shutting this one down.

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Hidden : 4/14/2005
Difficulty:
1 out of 5
Terrain:
1.5 out of 5

Size: Size: not chosen (not chosen)

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Geocache Description:

Midnight Cave is located in the Slaughter Creek Metropolitan Park

This cave is part of the recharge zone of the Barton Springs segment of the Edwards Aquifer (http://www.bseacd.org/hydrogeology.html). The cave was first explored in 1957 or 1958.

The entrance is a small sink, at the surface that narrows to a slot, then abruptly widens into the main chamber of the cave. For many years, thirty feet below the entrance, cavers rappelled onto the top of a steep, unstable slope of bottles, cans, old fence wire, and other refuse due to use as a trash dump for the active ranch. The garbage slope extended down to a trash-filled pool 57 feet below the surface. After the cave was aquired by the City of Austin, the city and the Barton Springs Edwards Aquifer Conservation District began a series of cave cleanups, and over several years, the trash was removed by the end of 2000.

Currently, the cave is entered down a 60 foot free drop to a muddy floor that slopes down to a pool beneath the waterfall that flows over a 40 foot high mass of flowstone. The pool is at the north end of the main room of the cave, a high, narrow fissure ten feet wide, 40 feet high, and 30 feet long. When Slaughter Creek is flowing, the waterfall's rushing water can be heard near the cave's entrance.

Midnight Cave is particularly important because the water that runs off of the hills west of the area flows into Slaughter Creek, which then flows underground (in the Aquifer Recharge Zone) and is known to affect the water quality in Barton Springs. Dye trace studies show that water from Midnight Cave takes 7-8 days to flow from the cave north to Barton Springs.

The cave is an excellent example of the numerous karst features found in the recharge zone in Austin: http://www.bseacd.org/karst.html.

Access is not allowed into the cave and the area is fenced off from the public, but you can still hear the rushing waterfall from the gate area.

This Earthcache was approved by the National Speleological Society.

To confirm your visit, please email me the last four digits of the phone number listed on the signs. Or, you can auto-confirm.

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