Ogof Hesp Alyn - 15 Jun 2008

Sunday June 15th 2008

Members present: Andrew Gilmartin,  Andrew Vick,  Nicola Gover,  Richard Gover

Bit of a short sunday trip due to lack of enthusiasm! My dad's been going on about this cave for years so its good to finally have done (some of) it. Short entrance pitch by the dry riverbed (ladder would have been better) then some crawling through muddy pools til it widens up a bit into a largeish bouldery passage, a fixed rope climb down a muddy bit (photographic evidence that the ropes have been there for at least 30 years!! :o ) and more passgageway, including some phreatic stuff, then you reach the sand crawls. These didnt need digging out so we left our spades here.
Some more climby, crawly stompy stuff then we reached an awkward climb up a rift, again with a fixed rope. Turned out this was a bit tricky at the top, so my dad decided to wait here, and after some faffing and lame attempts to get up i decided to join him. Quite pleased i did now i know the age of the ropes! wouldnt have liked to take a fall on them! The others went on to the canal and start of pitch one (we hadnt taken rope for the pitches) and were back pretty soon, some wetter than others!
Had a quick stomp around the other passages on the way out, including funnel chamber but i was lacking enthusiasm due to full bladder issues so we headed on out.
Quick wash in the river by the car, then off for chips in mold and home. All in all quite a fun trip, i'd like to go back sometime with rope for the pitches (and maybe as a handline) and do the rest :) less muddy and again much bigger than i'd expected!