Cligga Head mine

[Coxie]

I fancy a trip...

Anyone care to offer up a few gems of local knowledge?  :blink:

 

[Brains]

Had a trip with some of the DMC people a year or two back. Top entrance once found is straight forward in water up to mid thigh (beware the hidden boulder, I still have a dent in my knee cap )
A 100' ish abseil down a hading shaft leads to the middle level, and a climb down the great stope leads to sea level. All three lead to grass, but it is best IMO to visit and return internally. There are the usual hazards of false floors, rotting timbers, delicate artefacts, ore hoppers, internal stopes and shafts etc but as an old mine it is reasonably friendly.
The pitch has holes drilled for rawl bolts but these are not in situ, you will need to take your own. There are some eyebolts present but not ideally located for SRT.
Try contacting some of the SW locals via Aditnow or the Mine-explorer forums

In one of the stopes, pic taken by "Tin Miner" from DMC

 

[Brains]

Heres another pic, this time of Tin Miner rigging the pitch from top down to middle level

 

[gus horsley]

Done the trip many times.  I can offer detailed ideas for through trips etc, including one which doesn't need tackle, but basically Brain's posts above give the general idea.

 

[twiglet]

A small ACG party are coming down from Mendip weekend 15/16 May with Cligga mine on the wish list.Any info re safe route to the entrance & tackle free routes between entrances would be welcome. Is the zig zag path down to beach adit still passable ? Thanks

 

[gus horsley]

I might be free that weekend if you want to do a trip.  Otherwise the zigzag path is safe except near the bottom where the tide tends to wash debris out from it.  If you go partway down the path (where there's a grassy platform) and traverse round the scree along a faint path, you get to a low entrance which opens up into a level with daylight just above.  Straight ahead goes to Contact Shaft, with a few short older workings off to the left, and a level on the right about half way along leads via a rise (usually with bats) to a short drop into the big stope with its switchback floor: impressive.  You can get to the end to where there's a crumbly climb up and a pitch down but there's not much beyond that point.  In the opposite direction a couple of scrambles lead into a lower level which heads back below what you've already done and enters a passage which again leads to Contact Shaft in one direction and the beach in the other.  This is where the return back up to the top of the cliffs might be a bit iffy at the start but it was ok the last time I was down there.