Post date: Aug 22, 2013 8:59:42 PM

Poll Na Leprechauns - (Jock, Bus, Claire and Muh – 6ish hours)

Bus kicked me out of my drunken scratcher around half nine on Saturday, 2 hours later we met Muh and Claire at the fry stop in skin town and beat a path to Gurteen. I had marked the location of Poll na Leprechauns and Tempall Shetric on the OS map, taking the locations from the Irish cave index before we hit the road. We had been planning on a visit to the other side of Largy for a long time and with the help of the OS map we followed a widening country road up the hill nearest to the cave, driving up past some windmill excavations towards the forestry at the top of the hill. We stopped for a quick chat with the farmers up gathering turf from the Largy bog (…a woman died in Tempall in the 1920s or 30s, never been over that side of the bog you are heading to, tear a way lads have fun enjoy the sun)

Dandering west across the bog, following the edge of the forestry, it wasn't long before we were at the top of a very impressive looking Poll na Leprechauns. Much faffing ensued, a bolt was fixed and a bolt crushed a block, to enable a fairly prolonged tree hugging session above the abyss. A couple of slings around the bouncy tree later and we were off down the first green daylight pitch. Bus wasn't too impressed by my rigging so he stopped off to put in a long deviation just above a large, loose, boulder strewn rock bridge about half way down. The floor is fairly mobile where you touch it on the way down. Close to the bottom there was an old spit placement that enabled further progression down the final 6 meters to the base of the chamber proper. Following the boulder slop down, a low boulder squeeze required a bit of re-engineering in the form of a couple of swift kicks backed up on a safety line tied off a few meters further up the slope above. A rumble or two later and the crawl was looking safe enough for passage beyond another tighter squeeze.

There followed a lovely stretch of rift passage to another pitch head, where a spit was placed and enough natural protection could be found to help reach the bottom. Two low crawls not very dissimilar to some of the low crawls over at the bottom of Deep Pot on Largy were pushed but the prospects might require some determined digging. Back up to the surface. Muh headed off home while Bus, Claire and myself stopped off to meet Al and Petie for some chips and Guinness in Blacklion – Sharing tales of epic spanner hunting for the mystery definitely not Peakdaw cave.

Upon further investigation of the survey we realized that our visit to leprechauns was not as deep as we expected. Figuring out the way down to the 2nd set of deep pitches will need a bit more effort.

Note: there is only room to get two cars off the top of the road nearest the cave and you have to pass through a construction site that will likely be blocked if it is in operation. Leprechauns is an excellent, worthwhile adventure for anyone who is interested.