Abyss of the Sleeping Dragon

Credit: Matic Di Batista, DZRJL

The Abyss of the Sleeping Dragon is the abode of a mighty dragon named Mataj. He is old, some say he is as old as time itself. He has watched many things come to pass, and so, he is as wise as he is mighty. Tarragon, who is a young wizard and dragon master, enlists the help of Mataj in discovering the exact whereabouts of a precious treasure on Treasure Mountain. But is it gold, or something far more valuable?

The Abyss of the Sleeping Dragon draws its inspiration from a real-world cave of a similar name, Brezno spečega dinozavra (“the Abyss of the Sleeping Dinosaur”) located in the Kanin mountains of the Julian Alps. Kanin has been described as the “Himalayas of world caving”, as it hosts more than one-tenth of the world’s known caves deeper than 1,000 metres.¹  It also hosts Vrtiglavica, the deepest single vertical drop (603m) in the world.

Brezno spečega dinozavra (1040m) was given its name by Jure Andjelič, a member of the Ljubljana Association for Cave Research (Društvo za raziskovanje jam Ljubljana - DZRJL). He saw the outline of a sleeping dinosaur in the rock near its entrance, and this seemed the perfect name for a cave he thought would be gigantic in stature given the conditions present at the entrance.² Exploration of the cave began as far back as 2007 but it was not until 2021 that the cave laid bare its secrets to a group of committed cavers from DZRJL.³

The top photo is from Brezno spečega dinozavra while the bottom photo is from a nearby cave system, also on Kanin, called Sistem Renejevo brezno - Brezno rumenega maka - P4 (System Rene’s Abyss - Abyss of the Yellow Poppy - P4).⁴ Perhaps I have been reading about dragons far too long but I can see the outline of a dragon above the water in the second photo.

  1. Neža Pušnik, “V 'Himalaji' svetovnega jamarstva izjemno odkritje slovenskih raziskovalcev”, 24ur.com, 10 August, 2019.

  2. Tadeja Lukanc, “Na Kaninu odkrili res globoko brezno", Dnevnik, 14 September, 2021.

  3. Maja Korošec, “‘Ko stopiš za vogal, za katerega ni pogledal še nihče, je občutek res svojevrsten'“, 24ur.com, 19 September, 2021.

  4. System Renejevo brezno – P4, Uroš Kunaver Photography, Uroš Kunaver, accessed 20 March, 2023, System Renejevo brezno – P4 – Uroš Kunaver Photography (uroskunaver.si).