Post date: Jan 16, 2011 10:58:41 PM

Present: T.J. Connolly, Gar Devitt, Tony Furnell, Alasdair Kennedy, Éabha Lankford, Stephen Macnamara, Stephen McCullagh, John McManus, Ed Whelan, Conor "Rocky" Winchcombe

Trip time: ~7 hours

A big crew went for a leisurely jaunt into Shannon to celebrate TJ's leaving the country and Irish caving. It would have been a trip to the end of Noon's, then a trip to the bitter end of Shannon, before weather constraints eventually made it a trip to "wherever we can get to" in Shannon. Drills, capping gear and hopes for doing some work on the main dig sites were left behind at the carpark and we headed down the cave on parallel ropes with minimal gear to carry.

TJ and John racing. Third light trail is TJ's ghost... (photo TF)

Arty-travelling-through-Shannon-shot (photo TF)

Biggest group in Shannon Cave? L-R: GD; JM; EW; TJ; SM (back); ÉL (front); AK (back); CW (front); TF; other SM (photo TF [yes he can be in two places at once...])

It was Ed and Gar's first trip past Polltullyard and Conor's first trip past the Sandy Chamber, so a leisurely pace was decided upon, to point out all the landmarks throughout the cave. Ed must have been particularly enthralled by the walls of Rebirth Canal because he spent some time examining them up close. Water levels were predictably high throughout; the entrance to Pollahune from JCP passage had become duck with 4 cm airspace (so we decided not to include this this in the tour). Gar took a number of photos in bits of JCP passage with the rest of us as either models or mobile lighting rigs; a few people even took a look at the top of Les' climb at the Witch's Finger (perhaps? The big helectite, anyway). The first of the "ducks" (downstream of Swingers') was very soggy so the usual loose high-level bypass was taken, but most of the group stopped at the following low ceiling duck, which was up to a couple of centimetres' airspace.

Caving Underground Navigation Technicians posing (photo TF; 'look-in-to-my-eyes-you-are-feeling-very-sleepy')

In the high-level rift that bypasses the first wet duck, Stevemuh climbed up higher to a ledge, to see if there was anything that might bypass the second duck (this being the one place in Shannon where cavers currently have to get into the water to get through). It appears that there's mainly just a large amount of space up there, but there may be potential to bolt across an exposed climb under a series of hanging boulders, each suspended on top of each other, to get further downstream and back into highlevel rift traverses in the direction of the duck...

Back at stream level, TJ and Stevemuh went on through the duck for a jaunt, while the rest of us headed back upstream. A few folks checked out the Vegetable Patch; meanwhile John investigated the high-level climb (from downstream) that leads to further pretty chambers above the patch, and a window from which he regaled us with a reading from Romeo and Juliet. We went on via Swingers' Corner, where the Steves amazed us with their first tandem flight across the water. Stevebus, John and I climbed up high to the spacious area above the streamway where Aileen, Al and myself had previously climbed to highly decorated ceilings and tubes; Steve was particularly interested in the downstream direction of this, as an exposed climb requiring just one or two bolts appears to lead to further oxbow/high-level passage.

Further on upstream, a few boulders moved on someone on the way out of the choke beside Les' climb (apparently it wasn't Rocky, but I have my doubts). The 3-4 boulders on the right as you climb up (heading downstream) from the streamway into the choke are unstable. It should be noted that these will still move, so they need to be either avoided or gardened.

Éabha posing at the pitch (photo TF)

Beyond this there were no real issues and we maintained a steady pace back to the entrance, avoiding the odd loose rock on the way. Back to the surface around 7pm, in good time for our callout and to get some grub before the rest of TJ's "wake-end" could be enjoyed.

Fat Tony

Gar's photos from the trip:

Some more photos from the after party...

The dearly departed (photo Les Brown)

TJ, Emma, Jock, Ed, Gar (photo LB)

Steve proposes a toast (photo LB)

Some more of Les' here: http://s848.photobucket.com/albums/ab41/Shannon_Group/TJs%20wake_end/