Post date: Oct 27, 2010 12:10:44 PM

Petie, Al

Shannon Cave Two is a small subsidiary rising behind Shannon Pot, just on the lower edge of the scarp. It can be reached by traversing around the pot on the obvious muddy path to reach what appears to be a deep field ditch draining into the pot with a small trickle of water in it. Follow this channel for about 100m to where it emerges from a small cave behind a wire fence. The cave almost immediately sumps. The sump was passed by Martyn Farr in 1976, 4.5m long, followed by a dry bedding plane which becomes too tight after 9m. The water here has the same chemistry as the water in the pot.

This was a short trip with the intention of returning to Martyn Farr's farthest point beyond the short sump at a too-tight bedding plane and giving it a go. Consequently i chose a 3mm wetsuit, not the warmest thing to dive in but since the sump was only 4.5m long i would be out of the water quickly. The catalogue of forgotten kit included diving helmet with torches, neoprene gloves, and snoopy loops. I did have two silt screws but the bottom of the sump was rocky, so after a short first dive i returned to pull the snoopy loops off the silt screws. On the second dive i ran into a wall and after some fumbling around decided that the way on must be to the right. I returned again and let the water settle for a few minutes and also tried to warm up. On the third dive i followed the right hand wall. It was too tight at the beginning but moving on led to a bigger section that was blocked by rounded boulders. It should be possible to remove these, but the cold was too much.