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Descending into one of the deepest caves on Earth

探索地球上最深的洞穴之一

On a cloudless spring day in southern Mexico, I follow four cavers over a hill studded with pine trees, down 49 dirt steps, and across a grassy field. We approach a towering rock face on the side of a mountain so enormous that it’s difficult to take in all at once. But what drew me here, along with 69 world-class cavers from nine countries, lies at its base.

在墨西哥南部一个万里无云的春天，我跟随四名洞穴探险者翻过一座长满松树的小山，走下49级土台阶，穿过一片草地，我们走近一座巨大的山边上高耸的岩石表面，很难一下子将其尽收眼底。但吸引我和来自九个国家的69名世界级洞穴探险者来到这里的是它的底座。

Beyond a gash that cuts low across the rock face is Sistema Cheve - a cave with the potential to be the deepest on Earth.

在岩石表面一道深深的裂缝之外是Sistema Cheve洞穴——一个有可能是地球上最深的洞穴。

As the geologic cathedral comes into full view, I hear a quiet expletive escape Corey Hackley, the caver just ahead of me. This is his fifth year exploring Cheve, and its grandeur still fills him with awe. “The scale of this place is unimaginable,” says Hackley, who’s been exploring caves since he was about 10. “It doesn’t belong on Earth, in my mind.”

当将整个地质“大教堂”尽收眼底时，我听到前方的洞穴探险者科里·哈克利轻声感叹。这是他探索Cheve洞穴的第五年，它的宏伟仍然让他感到敬畏。“这个地方的规模是难以想象的，”哈克利说，他从大约10岁起就开始探索洞穴。“在我看来，它不属于地球。”

Hackley has grown restless in the past few days, forced to linger in base camp for a precautionary COVID-19 quarantine. He calls the hubbub at the surface “suffocating”—a term some might apply to the confines of a cave. But for Hackley and the other cavers, the depths are anything but.

在过去的几天里，哈克利变得焦躁不安，被迫在大本营逗留，以进行预防性的新冠肺炎隔离。他将地表的喧闹称为“令人窒息”——这个词可能适用于身陷洞穴之时。但对于哈克利和其他洞穴探险者来说，洞穴之深绝非如此。

They’re the last frontier of exploration.

它们是洞穴探索的最后前沿。

In 1990, explorers dumped green dye in the stream flowing into Cheve’s mouth. They discovered the colored water burbling out near the mountain’s base, some 1.6 miles down from the cave’s highest known entrance at the time. If a human could navigate the full length the water did, Cheve would be declared the deepest cave in the world, beating the current record holder—Veryovkina in Abkhazia, Georgia—by almost a quarter mile.

1990年，探险者将绿色染料倾倒在流入Cheve洞口的溪流中。他们在山脚附近发现了潺潺的彩色水流，距离当时已知的洞穴最高入口约1.6英里。如果一个人能像水一样游完全程，Cheve洞穴将被宣布为世界上最深的洞穴，以近四分之一英里的优势击败目前的纪录保持者——格鲁吉亚阿布哈兹的维约夫基纳洞穴。

The tantalizing possibility has drawn explorers for decades, and this 2021 expedition was the biggest push yet. Under the leadership of National Geographic Explorer Bill Stone, the cast of cavers clocked more than 1,500 cumulative nights underground and discovered over 12 miles of unexplored passages.

几十年来，这种诱人的可能性一直吸引着探险家，2021年的这次探险是迄今为止最大的一次。在国家地理探险家比尔·斯通的领导下，洞穴探险者们在地下累计记录了1500多个夜晚，发现了超过12英里的未勘探通道。

I first meet Stone after he’s surfaced from more than two weeks underground, one of his many trips into Cheve since 1988. Imposing in height and demeanor, Stone asks if I’ve visited the cave yet. I tell him about tagging along with a member of his team.

我第一次见到斯通是在他从地下回到地面两个多星期后，这是他自1988年以来多次进入Cheve洞穴的探索之一。斯通身高惊人，风度翩翩，他问我是否参观过这个洞穴。我告诉他和他的团队成员一起做标记的事。

I had shadowed Reilly Blackwell, who moves through Cheve with the sure-footedness of a dancer performing familiar steps. A mere 10 minutes into the cave, we’d arrived at Cheve’s first series of precipitous drops, clipped into a section of the miles of rope the cavers had rigged, and down we’d gone. Blackwell’s cheery calls had echoed out from the darkness as we’d scurried over fallen rocks and along scalloped walls until arriving at the base of Angel Falls, about a thousand feet deep. Just beyond lay the first of five camps the team had established at that time.

我一直在跟踪赖利·布莱克威尔，他以舞者表演熟悉舞步般的稳健步伐进入Cheve洞穴。进入洞穴仅10分钟，我们就到达了Cheve洞穴的第一个陡峭瀑布，夹在洞穴探险者们绑好的几英里长的绳子上，然后我们就往下走了。当我们沿着倒下的岩石和扇形的墙壁疾跑，直到到达大约一千英尺深的天使瀑布底部时，布莱克威尔的欢呼声在黑暗中回荡。就在后面，是该队当时建立的五个营地中的第一个。

As I gush about that day’s experiences to Stone, a sly look crosses his face. “That’s just the tip of the iceberg,” he says. “Camp One is kindergarten.”

当我向斯通滔滔不绝地讲述那天的经历时，他脸上闪过一种狡猾的表情。“这只是冰山一角，”他说。“一号营地只是幼儿园级别的而已。”

The cavers follow a multilevel labyrinth through the mountain’s underbelly. Carved by rivers over millions of years, some passages are big enough to fit a Boeing 747 plane; others are so tight the cavers can pass only while exhaling to compress their rib cages.

洞穴探险者沿着多层迷宫穿过山的腹部。经过数百万年的河流冲蚀，一些通道足够宽大，可以容纳一架波音747飞机；其他通道则非常狭窄，洞穴探险者只能在呼气压缩胸腔的同时通过。

As Stone’s crew tests the limits of exploration, pushing toward record depths and gathering mapping data on the way, camaraderie and teamwork are essential. By the end of the 2021 season, the farthest and deepest camp lay 7.3 miles, or about a five-day trip, from the closest entrance. Only a select few work at that point. Others tend the miles of rigging or search for swifter and safer routes. And all must shuttle heavy packs with supplies and energy-dense foods to stock the camps. For every bite taken underground, Stone says, “a whole chain of people have paid for that in sweat.”

当斯通的船员们测试探索的极限，努力达到创纪录的深度，并在途中收集地图数据时，友谊和团队合作至关重要。到2021赛季结束时，最远、最深的营地距离最近的入口7.3英里，约五天的路程。只有少数人在这个营地上工作。其他人则倾向于数英里的钻探或寻找更快、更安全的路线。所有人都必须运送装有补给和高能量食物的沉重包裹来给营地提供供给。斯通说，地下每前进一点点，“就有一整队人为此付出汗水”。

People at Cheve give different reasons for their devotion to caving. Many are driven by an “insatiable curiosity,” Blackwell says. She and Hackley both use the word “compulsion” to describe their desire to seek new passages. But the search can be dispiriting.

探索Cheve洞穴的人对他们热衷于洞穴探险给出了不同的理由。布莱克威尔说，许多人被“永不满足的好奇心”所驱使。她和哈克利都用“冲动”一词来形容他们寻求新通道的渴望。但探索的过程可能令人沮丧。

【Source】www.nationalgeographic.com

【Translated by】Spark Liao (廖怀宝)

【Illustration】From Bing