Standard Unit of Tom
Active member
Route: Daren -> HRC -> out Cnwc
Time: 9 Hours 54 minutes
Cavers: Standard Tom, Dylan
After having our club's (Cardiff) Christmas weekend away at the SWCC and 3 days of good caving, (Having embarked on a quick trip up the skyhook in OFD upon arrival Friday evening) one day of sitting at home doing nothing now uni had finished for the year was enough to bring the itch back. I scoured through my WhatsApp trying to find someone who had not already left for home and was willing to join me on this torturous endeavour (who also had a car 🤣). After tempting in Dylan with the lure of honour and glory, we would be the only people currently in the club to have completed this trip, we agreed to meet at 8am the next day.
I was preparing for the absolute worst, I had only ever done the through trip once and Dylan had never been in Daren at all. So the tackle was packed to the brim, 4 spare batteries, 2 spare lights, a zip lock bag full of chilli in the drum and the normal of first aid kit and emergency shelter (there was quite a few "fucking tacklesack"s thrown out later on). I'd also read about the ladder climb and traverses at higher things and threw in harnesses and cowstails which packed the bag full (we were very grateful for the harnesses)
We set off for Llangattock and were nicely met with zero morning traffic and breezed our way to the cave as the reality of our goal set in, the longest trip I've ever done was 11 hours but that was a horror show trying to get injured cavers out of Aggy outer circle and we were just going slow. The CSS website had recommended allowing at least 10 hours for this trip and that was 10 hours of hard caving. Upon arrival at the car park we quickly got changed and stuffed our pockets full of chocolate bars and headed up towards the entrance of the cave and the dreaded entrance crawl.
Maybe I've just got better technique? Maybe the half a year since I was last in Daren I've gotten fitter? But the entrance crawl was easier than I remembered and we were through in just under an hour and off to jigsaw passage, as Dylan began to realise just how long the cave really is and how misleading the size of the survey can be. We quickly made our way to the logbook in big chamber and signed ourselves in, then scrambled on up the boulder pile and up to the entrance of eglwys passage. We made good pace through the crawling sections until reaching Valentines chamber where we popped down the short climb and were surprised at how quickly we had reached the ladder. We quickly donned our harnesses and thought about the best way to approach it as we filled our water bottle back up, deciding that clipping our cowstails directly into the ladder as we ascend at our own pace was the best. I luv ladders (hate SRT) but 20m is very tiring and by the end I was very grateful for the ability to just sit back in my harness and rest for 30 seconds. After about 15 minutes we had both made it up the ladder, hauled our bag up and moved on to the traverses over the old pitch head. Having completed these we ditched our harnesses, down the rope climbs to white passage and soon made our way to the time machine.
I've seen in some fairly big passages in the year since I started caving, ogof Draenen, Gaping Gill main chamber but nothing could have prepared me for the sheer size of the time machine, it was simply outstanding. I went ahead for about 10 or so minutes to get a photo for scale and it still didn't show a large portion of the passage. After making our way eventually through the time machine we popped down into the bonsai stream way and began to make quick easy progress. The deep orange colour of the water (which I presume is to do with a high iron concentration in the rock?) Was interesting though made it hard to see a few of the rocks underwater. Stopping only at the Daren services sign for a quick photo we made it all the way to Hardrock with no trouble, only accidently climbing up the ladders to frig and frag Street before very quickly realising it was the wrong way.
The Hardrock camp was a unique experience of caving, it was the first ever cave camp I'd been to and the atmosphere changed drastically from the large passages of time machine and the fast flowing bonsai stream way. We snapped some pictures to prove we'd been there and sat down to eat some chilli before the grueling head back and eventual completion of the through trip. It made for a great underground lunch, even if a little cold, and the ziplock bag in the daren drum worked very well. Packing up our things and preparing to leave our spirits dropped, we had been in good moods the whole way here but now the realisation of repeating all that we'd done PLUS a projected 3.5 hours to complete the through trip was setting in.
The rest of the way back to big chamber was very uneventful, just quietly plodding along streamway and boulder passage, somehow managing the return trip 30 minutes faster, even with being much more tired. We quickly made our way through the rest of the through trip, stopping off to photograph the classic formations (white company, urchins and antlers), the series of "fucking tacklesack"s beginning at the start of antler passage and continuing on until we left cnwc. With each new passage we entered our motivation increased and we sped up as we entered prices prophecy and the connection to ogof Cnwc till eventually we made it to the gate and emerged into lovely high speed winds and horizontal rain, bruised and battered but a strong sense of satisfaction of completing the trip and quicker than the recommended time.
My first real experience of endurance hard caving, I'm definitely feeling the ache as I write this the morning after but am not discouraged. I would love to go and do longer trips again, they give a feeling that stomping round OFD top leading freshers trips just can't give. Maybe a day trip to restaurant in the future? Would love to see the blue greenies and also go to the far reaches of ogof Draenen.
Time: 9 Hours 54 minutes
Cavers: Standard Tom, Dylan
After having our club's (Cardiff) Christmas weekend away at the SWCC and 3 days of good caving, (Having embarked on a quick trip up the skyhook in OFD upon arrival Friday evening) one day of sitting at home doing nothing now uni had finished for the year was enough to bring the itch back. I scoured through my WhatsApp trying to find someone who had not already left for home and was willing to join me on this torturous endeavour (who also had a car 🤣). After tempting in Dylan with the lure of honour and glory, we would be the only people currently in the club to have completed this trip, we agreed to meet at 8am the next day.
I was preparing for the absolute worst, I had only ever done the through trip once and Dylan had never been in Daren at all. So the tackle was packed to the brim, 4 spare batteries, 2 spare lights, a zip lock bag full of chilli in the drum and the normal of first aid kit and emergency shelter (there was quite a few "fucking tacklesack"s thrown out later on). I'd also read about the ladder climb and traverses at higher things and threw in harnesses and cowstails which packed the bag full (we were very grateful for the harnesses)
We set off for Llangattock and were nicely met with zero morning traffic and breezed our way to the cave as the reality of our goal set in, the longest trip I've ever done was 11 hours but that was a horror show trying to get injured cavers out of Aggy outer circle and we were just going slow. The CSS website had recommended allowing at least 10 hours for this trip and that was 10 hours of hard caving. Upon arrival at the car park we quickly got changed and stuffed our pockets full of chocolate bars and headed up towards the entrance of the cave and the dreaded entrance crawl.
Maybe I've just got better technique? Maybe the half a year since I was last in Daren I've gotten fitter? But the entrance crawl was easier than I remembered and we were through in just under an hour and off to jigsaw passage, as Dylan began to realise just how long the cave really is and how misleading the size of the survey can be. We quickly made our way to the logbook in big chamber and signed ourselves in, then scrambled on up the boulder pile and up to the entrance of eglwys passage. We made good pace through the crawling sections until reaching Valentines chamber where we popped down the short climb and were surprised at how quickly we had reached the ladder. We quickly donned our harnesses and thought about the best way to approach it as we filled our water bottle back up, deciding that clipping our cowstails directly into the ladder as we ascend at our own pace was the best. I luv ladders (hate SRT) but 20m is very tiring and by the end I was very grateful for the ability to just sit back in my harness and rest for 30 seconds. After about 15 minutes we had both made it up the ladder, hauled our bag up and moved on to the traverses over the old pitch head. Having completed these we ditched our harnesses, down the rope climbs to white passage and soon made our way to the time machine.
I've seen in some fairly big passages in the year since I started caving, ogof Draenen, Gaping Gill main chamber but nothing could have prepared me for the sheer size of the time machine, it was simply outstanding. I went ahead for about 10 or so minutes to get a photo for scale and it still didn't show a large portion of the passage. After making our way eventually through the time machine we popped down into the bonsai stream way and began to make quick easy progress. The deep orange colour of the water (which I presume is to do with a high iron concentration in the rock?) Was interesting though made it hard to see a few of the rocks underwater. Stopping only at the Daren services sign for a quick photo we made it all the way to Hardrock with no trouble, only accidently climbing up the ladders to frig and frag Street before very quickly realising it was the wrong way.
The Hardrock camp was a unique experience of caving, it was the first ever cave camp I'd been to and the atmosphere changed drastically from the large passages of time machine and the fast flowing bonsai stream way. We snapped some pictures to prove we'd been there and sat down to eat some chilli before the grueling head back and eventual completion of the through trip. It made for a great underground lunch, even if a little cold, and the ziplock bag in the daren drum worked very well. Packing up our things and preparing to leave our spirits dropped, we had been in good moods the whole way here but now the realisation of repeating all that we'd done PLUS a projected 3.5 hours to complete the through trip was setting in.
The rest of the way back to big chamber was very uneventful, just quietly plodding along streamway and boulder passage, somehow managing the return trip 30 minutes faster, even with being much more tired. We quickly made our way through the rest of the through trip, stopping off to photograph the classic formations (white company, urchins and antlers), the series of "fucking tacklesack"s beginning at the start of antler passage and continuing on until we left cnwc. With each new passage we entered our motivation increased and we sped up as we entered prices prophecy and the connection to ogof Cnwc till eventually we made it to the gate and emerged into lovely high speed winds and horizontal rain, bruised and battered but a strong sense of satisfaction of completing the trip and quicker than the recommended time.
My first real experience of endurance hard caving, I'm definitely feeling the ache as I write this the morning after but am not discouraged. I would love to go and do longer trips again, they give a feeling that stomping round OFD top leading freshers trips just can't give. Maybe a day trip to restaurant in the future? Would love to see the blue greenies and also go to the far reaches of ogof Draenen.
