Present: Anthony, Julia, Andrew W., Tom
We’re in the Red lion in Penderyn, which is a fine pub with two fires! Anyway, to the caving.
After an epically brief dragon fester we drove up to SWCC, changed and stomped off to Cymdwr off the rusty iron bar that was holding the roof up, oops missed a clause out, I meant to say ‘to rig it’. That makes more sense. Then up to the old tram track to Top Entrance.
Went in. Stomped along for a bit and discovered I was still dehydrated from Thursday night. Found Gnome passage and ran to the end then ran back again and established the correct route on…. Got lost again in Chasm Passage, but after that, route finding was pretty efficient, in fact very efficient, laminated surveys are the dog’s bollocks.
Hmm, problem with having lots of names is that a write up turns into ‘went into X, went into Y’ etc. Ah Well, wibbled lots on the climb down into Maypole Inlet, ‘cos the footholds looked a bit slippy, but they weren’t. Met another group at the bottom of the fixed ladder, which was a good thing since they’d put some gear on a climb, which would have been a bit epic ohne gear. It’s really pretty round there but you cant admire the scenery whilst descending the ladder, since you’re busy trying not to get soaked.
Below this we got into the main stream which was WET. Very. But good. Contrast between the very dark rock and the pure white infilling tension cracks (apparently) was great, especially at Marble Showers. However, long before we got there, I managed to turn my ankle fairly badly. So we had to cave at my speed. Slithered, swam and stomped down the stream for a while, then climbed up into the great Oxbow. Put bandage on my ankle which helped a bit. Back into the stream, and stayed there for a long while. Anthony was first, so he got to fall into all the pools. Being short legged I wasn’t able (or couldn’t be arsed) to traverse the pools so did a fair bit of swimming. Dunno what the water levels were like compared to ‘normal’, but it was pretty sporting for us, without being especially dangerous. Except from the cold, they do recommend you wear a wetsuit in the streamway, and I guess you can see why…
Yeah, so lots of stream, some very pretty ‘cos of all the marbling, but f**king annoying not being able to see the floorr. (dear me, I’m going all Welsh with all these double consonants)
Julia Bradshaw
Whilst writing this we were socializing in a pub with a local where we had trouble understanding because he was talking fast and with a weird accent
Tom Wolframm
Well not that weird, a Welsh accent in Wales – gosh that’s strange. Anyway, before I was so rudely interupted….
More stream, fast water, deep pools. The last bit was a crawl, but not too long, then out into dry stuff. HURRAH
Can’t be arsed to name lots of names. Basically we followed our noses out though lots of dry passages with lots of taped pretties, cracked mud floors. Some fantastic stuff. Anyway, found (drum role please) the Cwmdwr boulder choke. I was some what nervous about this especially after our failure to get thru’ the choke last time. If we couldn’t get thru’ the choke we’d have to turn round and go all the way out. But it was remarkably easy. Sent Anthony scouting around to establish the correct route, but apart from Tom getting slightly stuck, we got thru’ easily.
Then out, via some horrible crawls that I’d completely erased from my mind, which were seriously pants with a buggered elbow. (word of advice, don’t sumo wrestle with James outside Mary’s bar – it hurts) and a chat with some Southampton uni types. Then up a nasty constricted pitch and out.
Magic.
Julia Bradshaw