No 2 Cave of Róka-hegyi quarry

The No 2 cave of the Róka-hegy quarry is a cave located in the Budai Landscape Protection Zone of the Danube–Ipoly National Park, in District III of Budapest.

Description

In one of the already abandoned quarries of Róka-hegy, the southeasternmost mountain of the Pilis range, on a nature‑protected area, the entrance of the cave opens at the base of the rock wall on the Danube side. The quarry is accessible by car; proceeding inward on the access road, the entrance to the quarry is reached and the cave entrance is on the left. On the opposite side of the road is the No 1 cave of the Róka-hegy quarry. From the road a beaten path leads to the entrance of the No 2 cave of the Róka-hegy quarry.

A cave of 3.2 m length opens from a rock fissure. It formed in Upper Triassic Dachstein limestone by underwater dissolution. The cave is a narrow, sloping crawlway. It is close to the frequently used road and therefore the cave and its surroundings are most threatened by discarded litter. No permission is required to view the cave. It is not difficult to explore and can be traversed with basic caving equipment.

The cave also occurs in the literature under the name Western No 2 cave (Sásdi 1997).

Research history

The cave was revealed as a result of stone mining. The Budapest lexicon, which saw the light of day in 1973, mentions that from the depressions of quarries operating or abandoned on the top and sides of Róka-hegy two small (water‑origin) pits and several small artificial cavities open. The cave’s name does not appear in the national cave list of the book *Caves of Hungary* published in 1984. The cave was surveyed on 22 March 1997 by László Sásdi and Richárd Kovács, after which László Sásdi prepared the cave’s plan map based on the survey. The map presents the cave at a scale of 1 : 100.