Just this last weekend, A group of friends and I decided to sneak back into the old abandoned quarry mine that we used to frequent when we all lived on the hill. This time, we came equipped with a tripod and and a digital camera that would allow 16 second exposures. This allowed us to open the shutter, spin our flashlights around like the lowest budget rave in the world, and in effect illuminate the entire inside of the place - something that we can only imagine with our small flashlights. Anyways, here they are.


Ah yes, the very first shot is my *** in sharp relief, as i begin to squirt myself down the tiny hole leading into the mine.

Down the hatch. It's about a ten foot torso-wide crawl to a gate in which you must skirt to get into the main shaft.

Sonia, Cody's girlfriend attempting a feet-first crawl.

Once inside, things start to get pretty large.

Then they get REALLY large. I have no idea how high the ceiling is in this room, but it has to be close to at least a billion feet.

More.

MORE!

Here's a shot just looking down one of the many hallways.

Same.


Then, we find the lake. Pictures will never do justice as to just how large this lake is. You can see me off on a distant shore there.

More of the lake.

Hey, even more of the lake!

Cave dwelling retards discovering the wacky joys of long exposures! Oh, you silly kids!

This is a little raft system someone rigged up, and Sonia, apparently training for the worlds most hardass girlfriend competition, jumped on a pulled herself across.


The Crew shots.
Cody, the kid behind the camera for most of this trip.

Sonia, Cody's main squeeze.

Me, that really sweaty kid down in the cave.

Carson, my bearded step cousin. Dude plays bass for the advantage.



Ok, let me get this straight - You haul all this **** down this tiny, tiny hole in the ground to this ancient, godforsaken place and you write "BASS AUTO ZONE" on the ****ing wall? Are you ****ing kidding me?


Ah, the main squeeze out. This part is not fun. I mean it, not fun.

This just reminds me of John Goodman squeezing out of the earth in Raising Arizona, screaming.

Almost out.

OUT!



All in all, it was disappointing to see how much garbage was down there - when we had gone there a few years ago, there was garbage - but this time it was obvious someone had a ****ing rager down there, with fireworks and all.

Thats right, Fireworks. Who the ****ing brings explosive incindiary devices to an abandoned, crumbling, turn of the century limestone quarry? Seriously?

Anyways, thats my thread - hope you like it.

 

Wow that was really wild!
And the only way into those huge caverns is through that little crawl hole?

Where is that?

 

I think there is another entrance, but it's a ***** to get to. That crawl hole is about that size for 15 feet or so, at a 45 degree angle.

This particular quarry is in auburn. And it's pretty illegal to go down there, but i thought the pictures were cool enough to post.

 

that's freakin' incredible.

thanks for the sick pics! too bad you didn't have scuba gear -- probably could have seen some weird blind fish or creatures down there

 

If by blind fish you mean giant man eating mutant squid, then yes,. The lake is really really deep, we dropped a glow stick attached to a rock once, and just watched it dissapear.

 

wicked cool pics man

 

That is awesome man, how far can you explore in there? man, that place would be a dream for kids to explore. My brother and I used to dream of finding something that cool in the Santa Cruz mountains, but all we ever found were bugs and pot farms. =\

 

im not really a cave person, but how come everytime i go into a cave (like 4 times in my life) its always a pain in the *** to get in because the opening is always freakin small. and it just gets big, why cant they ever make it big enough to simply walk in. anyways.....
dude that looks straight out of lord of the rings/movie/some fantasy. thats pretty tight. you can almost make a batcave in there.

 

That's sweet. I remember crawling throuh all kinds of tiny *** caves in Pennsylvania and New York. I always worried about my flashlight going out and dying in crevice barely large enough for my body.

 

Man, the inside of this place is massive, maybe a square mile or two of undergound passages, maybe more. It's just off highway 49 in the auburn canyon.

 

so how did people used to get in there back in the day, like when it was actually used as a quarry? did they cover it up since then or something?

 

Yeah, they probably imploded the entrance. That's what they have done with many of the coal mines in Black Diamond in Antioch.

-Chris

 

DAMN! That is awesome, thanks for sharing the pics!

 

firing up a blunt in that 6th pic?

 

Hhaha, no - thats actually breath - it's not terribly cold down there, but for some reason your breath is extremely visible.

The old enterance was right below where we crawled in, it is a massive concrete tunnel, but the imploded the entrance. This small hole we crawled through was carved by water.