Snowshoes are for Wussies.

The winter accessible caves are few, and unless one has a snowmobile, they are annoyingly hard to get to. Nonetheless, one has a need that can only be satisfied by a cave, and he must go.

I have had the coordinates of one winter accessible cave for a couple of weeks now. The pit is nestled about four miles into Tony’s Grove and purportedly has one of the biggest entrance rooms in Utah. Having made the hike to White Pine Lake a month earlier, I thought the road to Tony’s Grove would still be accessible for my 4runner.

The five foot snow berm blocking the Tony Grove road could be easily bypassed by the 4runner. We failed to notice, however, the Sheriff truck to the side of the road before the berm. We sped up only to slide to a stop as the nice little Sheriff man stepped out from behind his truck. The polite threat of a citation drove us to try our luck elsewhere.

We headed to the next best alternative: Canteen Springs. Almost to Bear Lake, we pulled off the road and parked among a number of trucks and snowmobile trailers. Considering the distance to the cave was under .5 miles and the dozens of snowmobiles had packed the snow down all over the hills, I decided to leave my snowshoes in the trunk. Brent brought his though, he had learned from two weeks earlier when he had forgotten his snowshoes and walked two miles in thigh high snow.

It was great packed snow for the first .2 miles, then straight to my hip for the remainder of the hike. Brent would only sink to mid calve with his snowshoes.

Once to the cave, it was a quick rig to a tree and a drop. From there a few tight squeezes and brushes past a dozen hibernating bats. The skylights in this cave make it pretty cool, along with plenty of living things that crawl into it. I can’t remember the last time I have seen so many bats. It is a small cave measuring at 450 feet in length. We finished the cave in a little more than an hour.

It would be a great first cave for those unfamiliar with vertical caving. It is a short vertical drop, and then the rest is a lot of fun horizontal crawling, squeezing, and climbing.

A few curious snowmobilers came over to peer down at us as we ascended out. The walk out was spent dodging the snowmobiles and sleds. After making it to the car, it was a quick ride home. Canteen Springs is a great cave for an afternoon outing, or for those who don’t want to get to far away from civilization.