As soon as he knew about it he got in touch with Arturo Rojas, the head of
a team of speleologists and divers from the Speleological Committee of the
province. By the end of November, a preliminary cartographic research had
shown no known cavities or signals of it in the area suggested.

Then, Arturo summoned his team and by December 4 the “whole group”,
including Pavel Gonzalez, Walmer Perez, Celso Perez, Maikel Cordova,
Yordanis de la Cruz, Osmel Silva and Orlay Leyva, were in the area.

“Very soon we walked into the woods to the get to the Poza de Martin, as
it is called by the locals. We explored it and found nothing interesting.
Hopeless, as we were getting ready to return, our guide Domingo Paz said
that there was another similar opening in the ground about 50 meters from
that place. We were already there so we decided to take a look”.

Arturo took a deep breath; his eyes were filled with emotion. “As soon as
I saw the sinkhole my heart started to beat faster. The color of the
water, the abruptness of the field, the difficult access, and the
virginity of the environment, were signs. This nameless place in karst
maps could have a few surprises for us”.

Chance took them there on Orlay’s birthday and as a result they decided to
name the cave Cumpleaños (birthday).

In an interview with ACN Walmer said that as they were on a preliminary
exploration they did not rely on the necessary resources to carry out a
more thorough investigation, so they did what the circumstances allowed
them to do, which was a lot as Maikel ––another member of the team–– noted.

After midday Arturo walked into the cave followed by Walmer and Orlay.
They checked water surface temperature: 24 Celsius degrees.

They went down up to 20 meter by an almost vertical pit; they run into a
narrow gallery and continued.

About 30 meters down they decided to walk through one of the many
galleries around them and suddenly, beneath them, they found a large hall
decorated with stalactites, speleothemes, stalagmites, columns, and other
geologic cavern formations.

They cannot believe what they see. They measured the hall in about 100
meter long and 70 m wide. It’s incredible.

Down there they observed some specimens of the aquatic fauna in caverns
such as lucifugas, shrimps, blind fish and some other specimens they
couldn’t identify. And they returned to the surface.

Near the entrance of the pit, Pino, Celso, and Pavel are waiting ready to
jump in. Arturo and Walmer recharged their oxygen gear to work with
conventional pressure as they cannot attempt to take a look at the bottoms
they were able to perceive from the beam of their light flashes.

They went back and near the hall they found a similar one. They are
fascinated but cannot go on. They need to get out as good sense commands.

It’s mid afternoon, December 6. They return home and before night they had
already informed the direction of the Speleological Committee of the
province on the news of the important finding, which soon spread nationwide.