Post date: Jul 19, 2016 12:15:26 AM

Aim:

Drop a rake of pots west of Hell's Letterbox

Team:

Petie, Rob, Michal

(A Breffni-Shannon Co-Production)

Time:

About 7.5 hours on the moor in total.

Back in May, while searching for Hell’s Letterbox, we poked our heads into many holes at the far western end of Series 5. Al, the Series 4 and 5 expert knew nothing of these holes, and reckoned they were unexplored. A look at a Cave Projects Group/Irish Speleological Association map from the 1970s marked these holes with series of question marks, further hinting at their virgin nature.

This then would be a trip to the bleeding edge of the Leitrim underground, a bold journey to the Heart of Largness, to Irish Caving’s Kuiper Belt, the final frontier of Irish potholing, an exploration as daring as Livingstone’s crossing of Africa, as poignant and visionary as the Voyager expeditions to the cold outer fringes of our solar system.

It began, like all great adventures, with a long siesta for myself and Michal in the Largy quarry carpark whilst waiting for Rob Mulraney to arrive, which he did some time after midday. The moor was pleasantly balmy, sunny and breezy. The Hell’s Letterbox area was reached after a solid tramp of an hour and a half whereupon we set to work dropping pots.

First up was a promising looking hole with several rowan trees. Rocks dropped sounded more than 10 or 15m down and a rope was promply dropped and Rob abseiled away down. Michal and the end of the tape went down next and gave us a reading of 16m. Rob and Michal rescued a small Newt from the bottom and I dropped down for a look. A pleasant descent dropped about 10m to a ledge, and a further drop of 4m went sideways into a roofed section with a choked bottom. This turned out to be the biggest pot we would drop, and it turned out to be already explored - Black Pot, as recorded on the CPG’s map, though there is no description that I know of.

After this we set into a familiar routine. Finding a pot, Rob and Michal would start rigging it, while I would wander off and find the next hole and to get our bearings. By the time I’d return Rob or Michal would be underground, usually standing on a pile of sheep bones, leaving me to bomb down to survey the pot. We dropped about five pots, none greater than 11m deep, some free-climbable, none hugely interesting. The most interesting thing was a pot very close to Hells Letterbox - a smallish hole with a fine booming rattle. I knew we were close to Hell’s Letterbox but wandering around nearby I was unable to find it anywhere. Just as Rob was about to drop the pot I copped that we were already at Hell’s Letterbox. Rob and I had spent six hours down this cave in May yet neither of us recognised it. Largy is like that.

By half six we’d followed the line of holes out west to where the holes petered out and became small grotty hollows. Our day’s work done we turned and began the return journey, our feverish, dehydrated minds continually dreaming of the bottle of lukewarm water back in Michal’s car.

-Petie