Bangor student caving club had our first freshers trip last week to Nadolig and Poachers.

Whilst in Poachers we had a decent sized rock fall (big piece being about 2x1x1/2ft) on the first handline in the lower series. Fortunately everyone was stood out the way of it when it flew down the passage  .  None of us are sure where the rock actually fell from or whether it truly fell or was dislodged by one of us. After the rock it begun to smell quite sulphurery in the lower series so we made our way out.

Best news is this did not put any freshers off and caving was summarised as "ordering a korma and getting a madras". 

Thanks for that information 

The area of the lower series, where the handrail is, suffered a floor collapse around 2-3 years ago - the whole chamber just suddenly dropped.

Since then, it appears to have been fairly stable ... nice to have a heads up that there has been some movement.

If you need any information or assistance with other caves in the area (Poacher's "Big Brother" (Ogof Hesp Alyn) is right next door for instance) then please do give me a nudge and we will give you every help and assistance 

There is a comprehensive knowledge bank of all the holes in the area here;

http://www.ucet.org.uk/index.php?option=com_kunena&view=category&catid=21&Itemid=191

Have fun  :ang:

Ian Adams
(UCET Secretary)
Secretary@ucet.org.uk
United Cavers Exploration Team (covering all over North Wales)

Sulphury smells after breaking limestone is reasonably common I think; I've smelt it after chucking a load of loose rock down a pitch.

It would seem that the Alyn Gorge and the caves therein are seeing an a lot of significant changes in the last 4-5 years. As well as the collapse in the lower series in Poachers eluded to by Ian there have been other subtle changes with aqueous passages becoming dry...  Further along the gorge holes have opened up and large volumes of water from the river Alyn disappear underground. It's like the geological timescale is being compressed by a factor of 100. I would expect that there may well be even more significant changes in the future and as the mud and silt gets removed it will leave a lot of unstable rocks waiting to harass cavers 

Dave