Exploring Hidden Mojave Lava Tubes of Pisgah Crater

I'm in the Mojave Desert today at the Pisgah Volcanic Crater, looking to explore some hidden lava tubes. Torrential rainstorms passing through Southern California today and through next week. And I figured, oh, what a great time to go explore some lava tubes out in the desert. I don't exactly know where they are. I know the Pisgah Crater is there. It's a young extinct volcano, cinder cone. And I think, as far as I know, most of the lava tubes are north-northeast of the crater. So we're going to head kind of in that direction. I know there's a ton of lava tubes out here. There's literally like hundreds of tubes out here. So unlike the more popular lava tube in Mojave National Preserve, these do not get nearly as much traffic. The good thing is, even though it's rainy and wet, because it's volcanic rock, I mean, the grip is awesome. They're really sharp and grippy, so I'm not too worried about slipping on any of these rocks. Oh, cool. Oh, I think we found the first one. Yeah, so this is just a little short guy, but still pretty cool. Beautiful rock formation, like different colored. Normally volcanic rock has that dark black color, but this has a lot of, must have like iron or something because it's really red. So I found the first one that looks like it kind of goes deep in there. I normally don't hike in jeans, but because the rocks are so sharp, I decided to wear jeans so I wouldn't tear my pants up. Man, this is pretty tight. Whoa. Nice. Yeah, so this is the first real big one that we've come across here out of the Pisgah Lava Tubes, and it looks like there's something on the other side of this. I probably could scrape through there if I wanted. I just don't want to tear up my rain jacket, so I'll probably climb out and go over the top and see what's on the other side here because it looks pretty cool. So the tunnel I was just in was right here. It's probably 10 or 15 feet long, maybe 20. The other side is this. Looks like there might be another tunnel or cave heading under there, so I'm going to go scope that out. Second long tube. It gets narrower and narrower, so I don't know how much further I'm going to go back, but it's pretty cool. I heard there's only one big long one. This is like the second one I found, so there's probably more than, I guess long is a relative term, right? Those rocks. Those rocks are sharp. Definitely bring gloves. Gloves are definitely recommended for this. This is pretty awesome. Pretty epic. Definitely off the beaten track. Everyone's always talking about the Mojave Lava Tube, and it's cool, but it's just, you know, it's big, so you don't have to do a lot of crawling like this, but just so many people go there. It's a real short hike. I mean, this is a pretty short hike too, but you hardly ever hear anything about this. Pizgat Crater Tubes. A little bit of light poking out up there. I'm just glad we haven't stumbled across any rattlesnakes or mountain lions or bobcats or anything yet, yet, but I would definitely, definitely recommend gloves if you're going to come here. For sure. I planned on bringing them, but I forgot. Taking you guys to the cool spots, helping you to get out there and be infamous. Hopefully you don't end up as bloody as I do sometimes, but, you know, skin, it grows back. The third one we found that looks pretty big. I mean, when I say big, I'm saying like relative to those little kind of like holes that we found initially. I mean, where you can kind of go in at least five or ten feet back. I mean, that's, to me, that's big. I mean, I don't know if we're going to see anywhere you can like stand up for the whole thing, but who knows. This is awesome though. So apparently this thing was like gassing off like six or seven years ago, venting some gases. So I don't know how dormant, I don't know how dormant it is, but it's not gassing today. So this is the first one that I've been in where I can actually stand all the way up inside of it. So in terms of height, this is the biggest one so far. It looks like it might curve around here and like maybe like a horseshoe, something like that. They say when you're spelunking, caving, exploring caves, they say you always want to have three sources of light with you. I'm kind of breaking that rule right now. I have my headlamp and my phone. I have extra headlamps in my bag, which I left up there, but I'm not too worried about getting stuck in here because we're not going too far back. Watch your head. Oh, I wonder if somebody lives in there. I wonder if somebody lives in that, in that little guy right there. Maybe a coyote den or something. I don't know. Should I crawl in there? It's tempting though. It's tempting. Yeah. Yeah, I couldn't make it. I couldn't make it. Too far back there anyway. It gets pretty narrow pretty quick, so. Nice. Look at that. Nice little belly crawl. Looks like the exit might be a rock slide. This is like a good beginner caving adventure because you've got a lot of cool caves, different sizes, different little nooks and crannies to explore, but still nothing like you're not hundreds of feet underground and, you know, I can still see the light at the end of the tunnel. So, probably, I mean, depending on how active your kids are, you could probably bring your kids out here. Yeah. Not too bad. Just don't let them crawl in those coyote holes. There's a ton of big lava tube caves and I was not expecting that. I read there was only one big one, but relative to my expectations, there's a lot more than one. So, I'm going to hit these on the way back to the car. I'm going to try to make it to the outer edge of where I think the end of the bulk of them are. Wow. So amazing. More awesome. Like, I had no idea. I had no idea about this. Like, it never gets talked about. All you ever hear about is the one in Mojave National Preserve, but, I mean, come on, guys. This, take it from someone who's been to both, this thing, hands down, kicks the ass of Mojave National Preserve lava tube. Pisgah Lava Tubes. This is where it's at. I probably should bust out my first aid kit and address this, but I'm just so excited. I'm having so much fun. So, I know that they call, they call this the suicide bridge because, I guess if you're daring enough to stand on it, you're risking suicide because it could collapse at any point. I mean, just because it's volcanic rock, I mean, it's not necessarily 100% stable. Some of them are pretty loose. Suicide bridge. I don't know how far back this cave goes, but we're going to find out. When you're in a cave, you want to try your best not to touch anything like this, this white deposit. This looks like bird crap, but sometimes it's like calcium, may not be bird crap actually, but you know, calcium that's built up over thousands, millions of years, that eventually could form like stalactites, stalagmites. There's also like a microbiome, a lot of microorganisms that live, you know, on these cave walls, so you don't want to disturb that because, you know, insects and lizards and a whole lot of different type of wildlife may be depending upon whatever microorganisms are growing, whether it's algae or who knows, but whenever you're in a cave, you want to not touch stuff. You don't want to, you want to look with your eyes and not with your hands. So if you're going to come out here to the Pisgah Crater to explore these awesome volcanic lava tubes, bring gloves. There's other things that spelunkers recommend like helmets and knee pads, elbow pads, probably not a bad idea if you got them. Try not to touch the walls of the cave. Bring three sources of light, you know, food, water, first aid kits, standard stuff. The other thing I'll say is I actually found a map that pins some of these, not all of them, but some of the caves on Google Maps, there's like an overlay map for that. I'll throw a link to that down in the description. And man, this is something you could do for maybe even more than one day. I mean, this is pretty, pretty vast area. It's slow going. There's no trail, but wow, I could spend, I could spend at least a weekend out here for sure. This is absolutely gorgeous. In the meantime, get out there, find your adventure and be infamous. Lava tube caves. What the hell did I just say? Um, if you're standing on it, if you're risky, if you're, so if you're going to come out here to Pisgahl, three source, infamous.