Post date: Jul 14, 2010 11:54:12 PM

Cavers: Eoghan, Gaelan, Petie, Róisín, Gerri, Al

The afternoon's speleological activities were planned to be in the old Cong canal, a not very successful 19th C. engineering project to connect Loughs Mask and Corrib overground (all the water drained into the limestone). Una had spotted a couple of potential sites while prospecting near the known Church Cave. As there are no names yet i've called these 'Una's Spring' and 'small hole' (suggestions on a postcard if no other names turn up). These can be accessed by a) driving the correct way for several miles around Ashford Castle estate at a sedately 10 mph, or b) ignoring the one-way sign beside the abbey, waving to the workman fixing the wall, and driving speedily around the bend; in both cases parking is by the Church of Ireland.

Walking north along the old canal, among the trees and rusting bicycles one comes to a point where a considerable stream is sinking noiselly among small cobbles. Immediately beside this in the east side of the canal is Una's Spring, a square section passage that ends abruptly after several metres. Here a small but powerful spring bubbles up, flowing into the cave to sink apparently in the south wall of the passage; a small amount of water was joining it from the stream in the canal, but this was after heavy rain. A bit of underwater excavation was done, but there's no obvious dry way on. We also grovelled in the cobbles at the stream sink, but no sudden cave was opened up and we desisted after a minute.

Church Cave lies south of Una's Spring and the canal sink, but in the west side of the canal; it extends under the C. of I. churchyard. Coleman reported (Irish Geography 1955) that it extended for 25' to where the roof met a muddy floor, and a small stream was seen inside the entrance. The entrance is large, approximately 8 metres wide by 3 metres high, and has the remains of a wall built to keep the canal water in the canal. The floor now is mostly muddy boulders, ending after approximately 25 metres in a rubble and rubbish choke. Eoghan however spotted a low bedding plane about 10 metres from the entrance on the right, and called for a volunteer as his light was 'unreliable'. I squeezed in and wriggled through just comfortably tight bedding plane for a couple of body-lengths, finally pushing aside a couple of boulders to emerge in a small pool in a rift. There was an obvious, and larger, continuation in both that rift and a parallel rift, so the others queued up behind Gaelan to squeeze through. After much pushing and breathing out, spurred on by the encouraging comments of those on the outside, Gaelan was got red in the face and quite stuck. Eventually enough was enough and he was hauled out. Petie then joined me, and while waiting for the others we crawled along the second rift, heading west (away from the canal). This opened into a large bedding chamber with a lot of roof break-down; another muddy rift headed east (towards the canal) but crawling over boulders and still heading west we entered a 'second chamber' (really it's all one big one, divided up by roof debris). Then squeezing carefully against the roof, which at this point was earth (the cave is shallow) we entered a 'third chamber', aligned along a rift. Expecting to find the church crypt we pushed this south into a tight crawl space which ended in a choke - through a small hole a second choke was visible, also with a small hole through which not much could be seen. There was no draft and we had no digging tools but it wasn't particularly inspiring. Of more interest was the north end of the 'chamber', where there was a static pool and apparently a sump. Eoghan, Róisín, Gerri, and Gaelan (who had passed the squeeze) had meanwhile explored the westerly rifts. Petie and i exchanged places with them and went to see what these were like. Crawling over a couple of mudbanks we entered a long rift with deep 'bottomless' pools in the floor, which eventually joined a cross-rift. For 10 metres in either direction (approximately north and south) this rift had deep 'bottomless' canals, also probably sumps, ending abruptly. Returning down the rift to Church Cave we pushed this to daylight, to emerge immediately inside the right-hand-side of the cave entrance. It's so obvious it seems likely someone has been in there before, but watch this space.... In any case, a survey is needed.

A little bit south of Church Cave, but in the east side of the canal, is a very small hole formed on a bedding plane. After exploring Church Cave to its present limits Petie and i set to work with ourTullyholvin-honed one-armed digging skills. This time it was in soft, dry earth which was speedily removed to make a space that was just big enough to worm into. A visible continuation of two metres, apparently a little bigger than the entrance, inspired some heaving and grunting efforts to get further, but unfortunately some rock needs to be removed or we need to diet. Gaelan came looking for some digging tools for the dig at the end of Church Cave, and we rejoined the others there. We managed to remove the first obstruction, but attempts by Eoghan and Róisín to get through the second failed.

On emergence a pleasant frolic was had by all in the warm waters of the canal sink.

Al

Post Scriptum: Martyn Farr did visit Church Cave a few years ago but reports that at that time it was filled with driftwood. It would seem that he has not been into the 'new' extension. Inquiries continue. A.

Post Post Scriptum: with the resounding failure of John Kelly, Mr Barry, and myself to turn up any written description of Church Cave beyond that which appears in Jack Coleman's 1955 paper, it seems we can claim the new extension to Church Cave. A.

Some photos [hosted on Photobucket]:

Una's Spring (sink on the right)

Church Cave

small hole (after excavation)