coryHansen

I want in on the Internet thing:

Directions and information to the Bloomington Cave

Also, check my Bloomington Hills scouting progress photography here

As posted in that link on Google Earth’s database forums thingy:

Caves that go about 250 feet into the Earth and features many passage ways and narrows that span over 1.2 miles under the Bloomington Hills Valley and surrounding washes. It is a faultline cave (as oppose to surrounding area cave systems which are mostly lava-tubes).

The cave is accessible through BLM maintained roadway off of a neighborhood street called Navajo Dr. From there you would drive up Cottonwood Wash. This is a moderately harsh road that would involve the requirement of a 4WD vehicle. Alternatively, an easier route can be taken from Highway 91 that most standard cars can take, at the expense of a longer trip from nearby St. George. Take the Apex Mine road and take a left at the first mainroadway fork (a sign is present), and this will get you into coming into the Bloomington area from the west.

The caves and pulloff areas are popular spots for partiers and thus see a lot of mishandling and vandalism. The cave entrance was first dynamited in the 1950s due to claims that it was insafe, but then was reopened sometime later. The entrances suffer from littering issues, graffiti and other spoilings. However local cave groups do make it out to do clean up efforts.

The cave is considerably cleaner once you get past the initial entrances where most ‘cavers’ tend to do their business. The cave Register is found past the second chamber on the white path, whereas it kept getting detroyed out in the view and by the car pulloffs.

As of early 2008, the main room on the south entrance is the home to a few interesting objects. A broken snowglobe, a cross with a glow stick on it, and a memorial to the hiker that died in a fall inside of the caves back in 2002 (a dropoff slope that is that the bottom of white route, in”the Large Room”). Supposedly there have been animal skulls found in the area known is ‘Northern Exposure’.

There are four different routes cavers can choose from amongst the complexity of caverns, all varying in difficulty.

I write this GE placemark to help others find this place, as it took me basically three trips of me searching for them in my Tacoma to pinpoint them exactly. The caves should be preserved for future generations, have fun partying but please remember to haul your trash back.

Below is a link to a picture of my vehicle overlooking the area where the caves are: