SITA GUFA, Gorkha

Herbert Daniel Gebauer - 06/01/2018

A triangular, partly walled-off cave entrance (about 1.5 m wide and 2.1 m high), faces an unidentified direction and gives access to a natural sacred cave (temple cave) with venerated calcite formations (speleothems). CAVE DESCRIPTION: The entrance to the cave is about seven feet high by five feet wide, triangular in shape and set back about 15 feet. A three-foot man-made wall partially closes off the entrance. This entrance area is covered with flowstone. The first room's ceiling height starts at twelve feet [3.66 m] and rises to twenty feet [6.1 m]. There are a few square blocks here, obviously fallen from the ceiling. On the left hand side there is a small alcove, that might be dug to give passage. Near the main passage, above and to the right are three small fissure passages that soon became too tight for me. From here the main passage is a long duckwalk with a uniform ceiling height. Just before entering a squeeze, there is a sloped chamber to the left that allows you to stand p. The squeeze can be negotiated on your elbows into a wider chamber about body length. At the end, a tight irregular squeeze on the left hand side leads to the second large room. This room is well decorated with pure white limestone. The chamber is further divided into a second, smaller chamber by breakdown which has raised the level of both floor and ceiling. A tight fissure slips partially around the breakdown at the end of the chamber. Where it is finally blocked, three small gaps between the breakdown suggest further passage (RUBINSTEIN 1987 with cave plan). CULTURAL HISTORY: … this cave is known throughout the Gorkha district … During Chait Desain, local people enter the cave en masse to view -pictures-, the images created by the different flowstone formations (RUBINSTEIN 1987). Keyword: darshan. SITUATION: Located below the school of Swera Primajar near Kartsook … The cave lies in a steep, thickly forested wall of a small side canyon. APPROACH: Travel from the town of Gorkha (N8°00': E84°38') via Khanchok, Gyampeshal and a what had been in the 1980ies a relatively large landslide where previously copper was mined, over the crest hill into a valley and descend past the school of Swera Primajar and a rock shelter or false cave, an overhang with deep shadow (RUBINSTEIN 1987).