Images from the Past

These old photos were sent to me by ex DCC member Ray Watson. Can anyone help identify the 'characters' and locations?

The one is entitled 'Canal'. Obviously in the Dudley Mines, but which one and where?

'Exhibition'. Who, where and when? Can anyone supply the details?

John Smith taking photographs on a trip down Wrens Nest circa 1977

OFD 2 Top Entrance. Who and when was this taken?

Somewhere in OFD.

Rescue Shropshire. Where? Also lots of people to identify.

Roger exiting a Shropshire lead mine circa 1977. Any further details?

Shropshire. Any ideas?

Yorkshire. Any ideas?

Unknown. Who? Where?

Return to Water Icicle

Unusually I had a couple of mid-week days off, so on Thursday Andy and I made plans for a week day trip. Our last visit to Water Icicle had been thwarted by bad air, so we decided to have another attempt to see the extensions.
As there was no rush I picked Andy up at 10am and off we set. The weather was horrendous on the trip over to pick up Mr Grimes and didn't ease up for the entire journey. Chatting away and with a heavy spray on the roads I sailed past my M42 exit and wound up taking a scenic route up the A444 adding almost an hour to the journey!
Eventually reaching the farm track we slipped and slid up muddy puddles, at one point with Andy donning wellies and pushing the car through a particularly deep puddle, until we decided we could get no further and abandoned the car to walk up the remaining track.
The rain had finally eased and we rigged in relative calm before descending the 100ft to check the air quality at the bottom.
Although our lighters lit we found that there were pockets of bad air in the passages that made harder work of exploring than normal. We decided to keep a check on air quality, but to continue to explore. We headed down North passage first through some very sticky wet mud until I crawled through a particularly wet contortion to find a dig face and the end of the passage. Spinning around in the small space I went back through with half my head submerged to a grinning Andy. Although I offered to wait for him, he for some reason wasn't too bothered about squeezing through the foot deep water to see a dig face....his loss. Our next passage was the North West where we quickly reached the gated extensions. After a quick look up the ladder we headed off to the Southern passage. We were soon at the breakthrough point in the great rift and at the taped extensions. These continued for 80m or so to end at a choke. Again we poked our heads in to a number of holes for a look, finding Donkey Kong Aven and then I spotted a pulley system and some rope. Popping down the hole I was soon in some flat out crawling which went and went and went until finally closing down too tight to follow (I later found out this is Olympic Stroll which goes for 65m). Realising Andy wasn't following I scampered back to him and we pulled on some very muddy kit for the prussic back up.

Finally changed and warm in the car we decided whilst we were in that neck of the woods that we'd continue on to find the location of another on Andy's bucket list 'Rowter Hole'.
We poked around a couple of big sink holes on the way over to the farm and there asked directions, which turned out to be through the farm to a tree line and then just the other side. Again getting very muddy on the way we quickly found the gated shaft and happily trotted back to the warmth of the car.

A muddy Andy and car after a successful trip

Present: Mark Burkey & Andy Grimes

Climbs, traverses, route finding and getting stuck.....again!

On the Saturday Jess and I spent a staggering 7 hours in OFD II diving in every hole, crawl, rift and passage we came across whilst never venturing more than 500 meters from the entrance! We had great fun connecting passage we were familiar with to cave we weren’t. Only once did we come a little unstuck. Jess was in a crawl pushing a tackle bag ahead of her when I heard it go thumping down a hole. Reaching her I looked down several feet to see her bag at the bottom of a small hole. Not thinking I jumped in, jiggling this way and that till I popped through and handed her bag back before realising that getting back up was going to be a tad more interesting as the hole had been quite tight and there were no foot holds to assist me. 2 minutes to pop down the hole……20 to get back out again…..that’ll teach me to look before I leap! J

Chloe braving a traverse

On the Sunday we were joined by Chloe and Ian for another jaunt around top. The route took us up the climb to the mini columns, where a belay was rigged for Chloe and Ian, through some nice wet muddy crawls and down the calcite slope at speedy caver. After this we took Edward’s shortcut to frozen river, then on to shatter pillar and Selenite tunnel before giving Ian a peek at the Trident and the Judge.  Continuing we took in swamp creek and the pitch head to the Nave before exiting via Salubrious.




Jess at Frozen River



Ian viewing a fomation in Swamp Creek

                          

Present: Mark Burkey, Jessica Harding, Chloe Burnley & Ian Millward

OFD 3 - Well 2 & three quarters nearly

A gentle Sunday trip was called for after the Bonfire Night celebrations, and so we headed into OFD 2 with the aim of navigating Mark to the Crevasse so he can lead his own sodding trip to OFD 3 sometime in the future.

We took a standard route into the cave and first headed to look at the climb down into Chasm Passage, which we would encounter later in the trip. Heading down the Corkscrew Climb we dropped into Salubriuos Passage. Jessica wanted to go left here and when challenged decided right was the way on and then when all incorrect options had been exhausted took the correct passage straight ahead to the bottom of Arete. Just past Arete we took a passage to the right with an entertaining climb near it's end to take us into Chasm Passage. Heading North we made our way to the Poached Egg Climb which was rigged with handline and descended. We soon reached Bhowani Junction and took a small detour to see Straw Gallery. Following this we headed to Creek Alley and the start of the Nyth Bran Series to look at the impressive formations high up in the passage. Now all that was left was a short journey to the Crevasse. Another party was met coming back from OFD 3 and Mark dropped down the Crevasse, went across the traverse and had a look at the ladder pitch. The rest of us stayed at the top and some photos were taken while we waited for Mark. The return journey was via Timo's Table and the crawls that lead off from behind it. Once back at Arete, we climbed up to the middle level and dropped back down the slippy climb that sits above the Corkscrew. Exit to the cave was then made through the Sandy Crawls.

Chloe in Straw Gallery

Formations above the start of Creek Alley

Chloe near Bhowani Junction

Chloe and Ian on the Poached Egg Climb

Present: Mark Burkey, Jessica Harding, Chloe Burney, Ian Millward and Brendan Marris

Oxlow and Maskhill - NO - Wharf and Hillocks

Well there we all where sat in morrisons waiting for the new lads to arrive so that we could do an exchange trip between Oxlow and Maskhill, when we got a phone call "we shall be a little late" so we sat there drinking yet more cups of tea, and we waited and we waited , suddenly thay arrived "you cant have breakfast get your ar*e into gear we are off" so we headed off at warp factor 2 hoping we could still get into Maskhill without another party being there, but it wasnt to be. So a quick conflab was needed and we agreed to go to Wharf and Hillocks to do an exchange trip there . Now this turned out even better as far as i was concerned as we could split the new lads up and give them an entrance each to rig, Ben was sent into the oildrum entrance, Grant down the engine shaft and Carl was sent down the climbing shft with me casting a beady eye over his rigging, now i didnt expect them to get it perfect as thay new thay were being tested, but thay did ok and we all got down to the bottem safely and did the exchange to come out, Ben derriged the climbing shaft, Grant derriged the oil drum entrance and Carl drew the short straw and had to derrig the engine shaft, all 200 feet of it. Well done lads all you need now is a new alarm clock to arrive on time.

 Report Andy Grimes

Present:  Andy Grimes,Ben,Carl, Grant, Mell Wakemen,Mark Burky, Jess Harding, Brendon Marris, Keith Edwards Graham Smith

Should have gone to Specsavers – Agen Allwedd and Eglwys Faen

Ian in the entrance series

This was my first trip into Aggy for several years and the first time I had seen the Main Passage by Scurion light and what an impressive passage it is. The trip was arranged for the newer members of the club and the planned destination was the Music Hall and Cliffs of Dover.
Five of us met up at Luigi’s in Abergavenny for the customary brekkie and then Brendan and Keith collected Chloe from the car park in Crickhowell. On finding Whitewalls open we asked if we could change inside. Jess left her clothes in the changing rooms and retrieved them after we thought we had explained to the whole party that Whitewalls wouldn’t necessarily be open when we got back.
On the way to Aggy Mark was sent to do the short through trip in Eglwys Faen. On arriving at Aggy I tried the key in the lock and found that my bad luck was still holding – it fitted.

The Cliffs of Dover

The trip to our destination in the cave was fairly uneventful except that Chloe found that she needs more practice on traverses and Keith and Brendan walked past the entrance to Southern Stream Passage thinking it was the next passage on the right.

On the way out we stopped at regular intervals to take photos and video and remarkably no one complained. The cave does seem like a completely different place and much nicer with 4100 lumens of light. On the way out we did manage to find Southern Stream Passage and did the first few metres.
On the way back to the cars we stopped at Eglwys Faen and this time five of us (Brendan excluded) did the through trip from the Main Entrance to the Waterfall Entrance. As Brendan had decided not to join us he was loaded up with boxes and bags and dispatched to the exit. This cave too seems like a completely different and much nicer cave when well illuminated. On exiting, the waterfall was flowing freely and the small passage leading to daylight was half full of water so a thorough soaking was guaranteed.
Back at Whitewalls Mark found that he had left (or it had been left) his spare Scurion battery outside Eglwys Faen and had to walk all of the way back to retrieve it. Still, although this is a long walk, it required slightly less effort than when he had to go back down Knotlow Engine Shaft and back up when a re-belay had not been untied. The rest of us found Whitewalls was indeed locked up. Under my car was a black plastic bin liner full of clothes. Chloe hadn’t heard what we had said about the hut being locked up and had left her clothes inside but some kind person had saved her embarrassment.

The Music Hall

The Main Passage

Later in the car Brendan realised that when he had put his contact lenses in inside the changing rooms he had not picked up his specs. Fortunately he had been to Specsavers but on returning home was going to have to turn the house upside down to find where he had put the ‘spare pair’. Then on Monday I received an email from Ian saying, “Would you have contact details’ for anyone at the club hut yesterday, as I managed to leave my glasses in the back room when we were changing in the morning.” He went on to say, “My intention is to send the contact person a S.A.E. with a spare spectacle case that they can pop them in and post back to me (that will save a car or even a train journey, now who had to do that once before??” The new members learn very early on how to take the p*** out of the chairman!

The Main Passge

The Team: Keith Edwards, Brendan Marris, Chloe Burney, Jess Harding, Mark Burkey and Ian Millward

Hidden Earth Video Competition

Here is what was my entry for the Hidden Earth 2012 video competition.

There were 4 entries on the competition. I didn't win and I didn't get a distinction or a merit, but I did enjoy making it.
I must say a big thank-you to Mark, Steve and Brendan for their encouragement, support and acting ability.