Despite the cold, Lake Solitude glistened in the sun’s rays. They had picked one of the few weeks of the year in which the lake’s surface had thawed, presenting the pristine waters below its surface.
In the distance, the enormous mountain peak of Mount Oztal could be seen, followed by a steep row of thousands of giant pine trees. At this distance, they looked like blades of grass until they reached the banks of the lake. There, the lake’s shallow edge was a soft turquoise, and the crystal clear water of the recently thawed ice allowed Sam to see the limestone bottom as easily as if he were looking through a window, but impossible to hazard a guess as to its depth. He was able to follow the lake’s bottom for some distance before the sunlight failed to penetrate the extreme depths at the center of the lake.
It was here that Sam hoped that the Magdalena had come to rest, thus remaining hidden, for all these years.
“Of all the places we’ve seen since we came here Sam, this must be the most magical of them all.” Tom said, reverently.
“That’s for sure. It’s magical enough that I’m worried someone else must have surely dived it before now. Heck, if I had known about this place, I’d have made a trip to dive here years ago. Let’s just hope that it releases its secret — the final resting place of our missing airship.”
“Agreed. There’s just one way to find out.”
They each wore an inch-thick dry suit, under which they wore a thick layer of thermal clothing and a woolen beanie. The water was going to be icy cold, and having already checked and rechecked the math of their decompression requirements at this altitude, hypothermia would be their greatest risk.
On their heads, each wore a Neptune Space Diver Mask with a push-to-talk communications system (PTT), double LED lighting, and a camera to record the trip.
Loading their equipment first, Sam and Tom climbed down into the inflatable Zodiac, in which they were able to motor to the middle of the lake. Where the lake turned from light green to an almost black aquamarine signified that they’d reached the deepest section of the lake. There, they ran a dive line to the bottom.
“Let’s see how deep this thing goes…” Sam said, as he started to feed the dive wire.
“100 feet, and still running freely,” Tom said a few minutes later.
“Keep her going until she reaches the bottom.”
“150 feet, and still going.”
“If our airship is sitting at the bottom, I can see why she remained hidden so long,” Sam said. “Diving near ten thousand feet is one thing, diving to depths below 150 feet while at such altitudes, is another thing entirely for the recreational diver.”
“Forget the recreational diver. I’m a professional, and I’m still not keen on it.” The wire stopped running at 180 feet, and the line went slack. They had reached the bottom. Tom looked at Sam, and asked, “Shall we see what’s at her bottom?”
“Let's.”
They would do their deepest dive first. Besides, they both were eager to know whether or not their hunch was right, and the most likely answer to that question was waiting for them at the deepest part of the lake.
Sam placed the regulator in his mouth, checked that his buoyancy control device (BCD) was inflated, placed his right hand on his facemask, and rolled backwards off the zodiac.
He broke the still of the morning’s water with a giant splash, the icy water sending lightning signals up his spine.
I don’t care how beautiful it is, I hate altitude diving.
A moment later, Sam was floating on the surface of the lake. He placed his hand on his head, forming a simple symbol for the letter “O” which meant that all was okay.
Above him, in the Zodiac, he watched Tom respond, using the same symbol, before following him into the water.
Once the bubbles settled, he heard Tom’s voice through the PTT device in his facemask.
“You didn’t mention how fucking cold the water is!”
“I didn’t think you’d follow me in if I did.”
“Come on, let’s start the descent.” Tom said. “Hypothermia’s going to be a bitch the longer we wait.”
The two of them started to descend.
The clear water made it all but impossible to determine distances. Sam was always baffled when people would talk to him about how scary it was diving in murky water. When the water was crystal clear like this, your depth perception became so warped that it was easy to make the kind of mistakes that get you killed, either during a descent or ascent. For that reason, both men kept their depth gauges out in front as they made their descent.
Sam’s eyes feasted on the surreal environment they had entered.
The limestone gave a distinct green glow through the water, as the sun’s rays penetrated the surface above. Near the rock where their helicopter rested, Sam could see a series of tunnels, all of which were much too small for the Magdalena to have entered, but which caused a myriad of reflective displays as the light traveled through. He made a mental note to come back and explore them later, if given the chance to do so before they left.
At a depth of ten feet, he opened his jaw, subconsciously equalizing for the change in pressure, as he continued his descent.
The rocks to his side appeared to be perhaps twenty feet away, in the exceptionally clear water. As an experienced diver though, Sam knew from the position of the zodiac, that they were more like 500 feet away.
At a depth of fifty feet they passed the two large air tanks which were tied to the dive line at the 50 foot marker. These were emergency air supplies, just in case something went wrong on their ascent.
One hundred and eighty feet was well beyond the realm of a no-decompression dive. It meant that what would be a quick drop to the bottom, would require a much longer and slower ascent.
“We’re just under a third of the way down,” Sam said. “How are you feeling, Tom?”
“Cold. How about you?”
“I’m all right. If I’d known what you were dragging me into, I would have brought along my ice diving gear.”
“If I’d realized what we were in for, I would have done the same thing too,” Tom remarked.
“Did you see the caves near our rock?” Sam asked, as he pointed toward them.
“Yeah, they were probably formed by the avalanche all those years ago.”
“Seems a likely explanation. If we get a chance, let’s make a shallow dive there later today.”
“Sounds good,” Tom agreed.
Descending into the deepest section at the center of the lake, Sam noticed that the shape of the lake, as seen from the air, varied greatly in the central section, which dropped to 180 feet, whereas the depth of the rest of the lake was somewhere in the vicinity of 30 to 40 feet, and had a silty bottom. The central section appeared to be more like the tunnel of a giant earthworm, burrowing its way down to the center of the earth.
Sam turned on his powerful hand torch for a few minutes as he continued his descent, and shined it along the rock walls.
My God, we’re in ancient lava tunnel!
The walls were shaped as an ancient sinkhole, formed in the soft limestone over a period of millions of years. It was almost entirely cylindrical, as though something had intentionally created it. At its widest point, it was no more than 150 feet across.
“Hey buddy,” Sam could hear Tom’s voice, “I don’t know about you, but something about this hole makes me feel like we’re caught somewhere between reruns of 'The Abyss' and 'Journey to the Center of the Earth.’”
“Or, 'The Silence of the Lambs'?”
“Yeah, that’s seems more like it. It’s giving me the creeps,” Tom murmured.
“I wouldn’t worry about it too much. It’s no different than the thousands of other naturally occurring limestone tunnels found throughout the Dolomites,” Sam said, looking down at his depth gauge and at the darkness below. “Besides, what sort of monster could be bothered living in such an inhospitable environment?”