In 1997 the CRF saw important advances in the project at Mineral King. The Cirque mapping project is effectively completed and the preliminary map has been field checked. Jeff Cherez made an exciting new find in the Panorama side of the valley. This year no bears were lured to the dark side.

After 5 years of survey there is a map of Cirque cave. One hundred fifty three stations gave 1704 feet of survey (519 meters) with a vertical relief of 72 feet(22 meters). While field checking the map this summer we did find one high lead which gave us another 100 feet of passage near the green pool. There are a few more feet that could be squeezed out of the cave by the desperate but no known lead of any significance remains.

The most exciting occurrence in Mineral King this year is the survey of a new cave found by Jeff Cherez. "Beulah" cave is on the Panorama side of the valley near cascade creek. Jeff was ridgewalking the Panorama side with Merrilee Proffitt when he found the entrance. He did not have adequate time to explore it. This year he returned with Brad Hacker to survey 1021 feet (311 meters) with 83 stations. The vertical depth is 158 feet (48 meters).

Survey continues in White Chief. This year’s one expedition completed the B-survey in the upper stream passage. A new survey took off towards the insurgence but ended up much higher than that. The last team did upper level passage above the big room. So far we have set 151 stations for 2348 feet (715 meters) and a depth of 317 feet (100 meters). This coming year we need to continue the C-survey towards the insurgence, follow the water downstream towards the resurgence, and start to work on the maze around the Meyer entrance. Other survey work to be done includes the smaller caves of the valley such as Batslab and Seldom Seen as well as surface surveys linking more of the caves together. Eventually I wanted to have all the caves linked together either by surface survey or by GPS and include the sinkholes that lead toward Eagle sinks.

Snow canceled the October trip to Mineral King. Eight inches of fresh white powdery stuff at the ranger station kept most vehicles out of the park. A few valiants still wanted set stations with tire chains and snow camping but in the end everyone ended up in Three Rivers for breakfast before hiking in the rain up the Marble Fork of the Kaweah to Marble Falls and Wild Child.

We must continue to work with the park to protect the Mineral King ecosystem. This year there were no problems with bears however we must remain vigilant in hanging our food in a counterbalance system so that there is no temptation to partake in anything other than nuts and berries. Our worst problems were with the "bears" of the 5 pound variety. Marmots are happy to partake in processed food as well. One person’s food bag disappeared while preparing camp. A quick search revealed that the last visible bit was heading into a marmot hole. Given a few more seconds there would have been one hungry caver and one potentially ill marmot. Please keep track of your food when you are in the high Sierra.