THE BOLT HOLE OF THE BANDOLEERS

The Ferrería River is about the most perfect location for caves you could ever want. The cool river has deep spots for swimming, a flat, sandy place to camp, lots of shade trees and countless birds to watch. If that's not enough, there's a spring-fed soaking pool on one side and a warm and bubbly waterfall on the other.

With all that, you could almost forget the caves... especially Paso Real Histo Cave whose name speaks for itself. This one was once visited by Luis Rojas and some CEO buddies. Of the five, only one refused to partake liberally of the bottle of vodka that was passed around and this individual was the only one to end up with histoplasmosis... and an extremely bad case at that.

So, one fine day when Luis told us about another cave along that same river, we said, "forget it." However, when he replied that his little daughter Yunuen had been inside with no ill effects and that there were "all sorts of unexplored passages," we just couldn't resist.

The Bolt Hole of the Bandoleers is named after outlaws who supposedly hid their rifles here in bygone days. Naturally, it is also said to be filled with treasure, which explains numerous excavations and long poles found everywhere. Once you work your way past the breakdown entrance, it soon becomes evident that this is a multilevel cave. The "ground floor" eventually winds you around to a small hole in the wall (la Ventanita) which is just about exactly the width of Andy Edris.

Most people go through La Ventanita feet first and lower themselves down to an old log from which you can climb down to the floor XXXXXX meters below. Andy, however, demonstrated how to apply American Football skills to the caving scene by squeezing through the hole (no mean feat) head first, plummeting downward (with all the grace possible under such circumstances) and applying a flying tackle to ye olde (and I do mean olde) log.

Thus we arrive at what could be called "the basement" of the cave (although there are easier means of arrival than Andy's). Here we find the nicest formations in the whole place, a curious room nearly cut in two horizontally by a large, thin shelf and The Blue Room which features a little patch of sky XXXXXXXX meters above, peeking through The Chimney. Naturally, any caver who sees this immediately thinks, "What a gorgeous rappel" - a thought that led Juan Blake and several others on a merry search of the mesa above. Juan succeeded in starting an avalanche but couldn't find the elusive hole.

However, thanks to the dedication and patience of the fourteen people who helped survey the cave (unlike certain individuals!) ── and thanks to our SmartLevel ── we were able to calculate, in the comfort of home, that the famous Chimney should lie 68 meters from the entrance at 124 degrees (SE).

Could our mapping be accurate enough to lead us straight to the Chimney from up on the surface? One weekend in May of 1994 we climbed the (nearly vertical) hill and lined up several volunteers along 124

So at last we learned just why it is that cavers map caves!

While we have pretty well checked out the "ground floor" and "basement" of this cave, there still remains what looks like an attic. Luis Rojas, Vicente Loreto, Susy Pint and Juan Blake have all poked around in holes leading upward, but just how far and where they go is still a mystery.

So frequently have we visited this particular cave (drawn, of course, by love of cave mapping, not the recreational paradise outside) that many a nostalgic memory surfaces at the mere mention of "Bandoleros." Who could ever forget Cecilia Gómez shouting, "Me go through that little hole? Forget it!" Or Claudio Chilomer's daring (but doomed) battle with Claustrophobia: "Me climb up that little worm hole? Forget it!" And who will ever forget the sight of Don Andrés Robles happily clambering around the most remote parts of the cave while dressed in an immaculate white shirt and sporting not an ugly helmet but a spotless white sombrero? (How he got it through the Ventanita I'll never know). And finally there is the lingering memory of José Luis Zavala exorcising the ghosts of those long-dead Bandoleros by playing on his recorder a haunting melody which rose and fell and floated and flitted through the echoing caverns like the very spirit of ZOTZ him - or her - self.