Team: Petie, Aileen, Steve Bus and Róisín
Duration 5.5hrs
I had timed it brilliantly, being back in NI on the second Saturday of the month, with caving plans already set (even if it was digging) and Aileen mostly recovered from her bout of covid. We set off later than planned, the wild abandon (2 maybe 3 beers) enjoyed over Friday Games Night had dulled the senses of some. Over breakfast Aileen busied herself like a member of house staff for a successful Victorian industrialist, degreasing the silver table service, in her case, the plug and feather bits we were hoping to require. Gear was fetched and packed. We were aiming to investigate two of the leads left after the last trip in June; the top dig (Eoghan’s dig) and upper of the two lower digs.
After spontaneous fretful pitstops for more carbs we set off and with the recent dry weather were parked at the turning point at the end of the road and striding off to Ramsons by 11.15 with our many heavy things. Aileen rigged and we convened at the top of the bottom pitch in ICC. Bus was having a great time gardening and clearing a nice ledge to stand on, we sent some very large and booming boulders over the edge in the name of safety. Once at the bottom Bus and Petie headed off to the more hopeful of the two digs at the bottom whilst I followed Aileen with her crowbar in hand down to Eoghan’s dig. I waited at the last bit where you could feasibly turn around and listened to Aileen continue on in a flat-out, downward crawl along the gravelly muddy floor. After a few minutes from the distance I heard a plaintiff call, ‘Roisin, can you still hear me? Incase I can’t get out?’. I made reassuring sounds and heard various grumbles and shuffles. When she reappeared 15mins later after a 20m uphill reverse using the crowbar for purchase she reported she had made it a further 10m than Jock’s last attempt with some digging. There remained a draught and sound of a water falling in the distance. Potential for an awkward and slow dig but hope remains.
Once out we joined the lads and found Petie at the digface with Bus clearing the spoil. We dug for a couple of hours with middling enthusiasm and limited progress was made. The dig had much to commend it, the digging was neither hard nor easy but most commendable of all, it was safe. Happily there is plenty of space for spoil but a lot of material will have to be shifted, at least you can just push it downhill! Lying in a wet, clayey and gravelly tube you excavate ahead of yourself and push the spoil back….alas the shovel was stuck in straight mode, I found the crow bar much more effective, Aileen longed for a three pronged hand trowel. Admittedly I lacked Beck’s enthusiasm for this dig and put in a pathetic amount of effort; having looked ahead through the 20cm gap between the infill and roof I saw nothing, heard nothing, nor felt a draught or any indication which would give hope that clawing my way forward was worth it. That said, it had been quite dry and Bus, ever persistent and optimistic, thinks a return after some proper rain will give better indicators that a connection to PPP somewhere below PPP (i.e. new cave) is potentially plausible. Perhaps he is correct.
Once a satisfyingly large boulder was shifted we decided that was a good bookmark on which to leave the dig and we made our exit, impeded by the mud’s effect on the jammers. The drill and plug and feather bits were not required. We spent a good 90mins cleaning the cave off our gear in Blacklion before joining Les at the Customs House.
Róisín