Cussey Pot, Eyam

[danthecavingman]

Re Baggers - Batham Gate seems to be very near the surface - any thoughts of looking to gain entry from there.

I seem to recall there were a couple of possibilities of Bagshawe connecting to the surface. Bradwell Parish Cave one possibility and Outlands Head Quarry Cave (Now lost) the other. There may be other opportunities.
I always thought the site with most potential in Bradwell Dale was the choke at the end of Walkers Grotto. The fact that the Bagshawe stream backs up in there in flood means it would almost certainly give access to the upstream passages towards the swallets. Ray Fairholme (I think) dumped some fluorescein in there in the eighties during a big flood. The Lumb ran bright green fifteen minutes later....

 

[wellyjen]

I seem to recall there were a couple of possibilities of Bagshawe connecting to the surface. Bradwell Parish Cave one possibility

There is a dig now going on in Bradwell Parish Cave. See Derbyshire Caver 157.

 

[pwhole]

Ha! Jenny beat me to it. By choke in Walker's Grotto do you mean the flowstone-filled tube at the far end? Or the one in the floor? On a visit recently I noticed another slot down on the left side of the main slope (looking in), which didn't appear to be on the survey. It would be in the middle right of the shot below, against the wall. Two shots of the choked continuation of the tube follows that.

Mark McAuley is running a TSG dig in Bradwell Parish Cave (with permission) at present - it was documented in the last Derbyshire Caver (including front cover), and two of these photos were included.

 

[Mrs Trellis]

I was asking about a possibly easier route into the high level large passage via Madame Guillotine.

 

[pwhole]

This 'Water Shaft' feature on the old Barmaster's map has always intrigued me - anyone know what it refers to?

 

[Mrs Trellis]

It would be excellent if some genius could overlay the survey onto that old map.

 

[bograt]

I must confess to being somewhat confused, has Cussey Pot finally been connected to the Bradwell area, or has the thread been hijacked? ---

 

[danthecavingman]

Ha! Jenny beat me to it. By choke in Walker's Grotto do you mean the flowstone-filled tube at the far end? Or the one in the floor? On a visit recently I noticed another slot down on the left side of the main slope (looking in), which didn't appear to be on the survey. It would be in the middle right of the shot below, against the wall. Two shots of the choked continuation of the tube follows that.

Mark McAuley is running a TSG dig in Bradwell Parish Cave (with permission) at present - it was documented in the last Derbyshire Caver (including front cover), and two of these photos were included.

View attachment 16662

View attachment 16663

View attachment 16664

The boulder choke in the floor. I'm pretty sure the divers got close to this from the resurgence end. There was interest in this years ago but the owners at Hazelbadge were extremely anti caver. There's an old rumour of people being chased off site after a shotgun was discharged into the entrance.....

 

[Mrs Trellis]

.....and possibly Bradwell Parish Ave whilst you're at it.

I must confess to being somewhat confused, has Cussey Pot finally been connected to the Bradwell area, or has the thread been hijacked? ---

It sort of wandered off in the middle when TA revealed where they'd been working.

 

[JonP]

I was asking about a possibly easier route into the high level large passage via Madame Guillotine.

We visited the end of Batham Gate (Hollywood Bowl series) a few months ago, surprising how big the passage is up there! We had a team of 4 and all were flabbergasted at it's size and length! We're talking 4m wide & 2m high in places, it's a big old higher level fossil passage. We intend to go back to take photos and samples. The end dig looks very uninspiring and seems to be heading down-dip at the end, heavily silted with a slight draught. There's a couple of features along Batham Gate which are of note; a passage approx a third of the way along which ends at a dig with air-space and draughts! This is also un-surveyed (another job which needs doing). Newhall Aven which is a 8m high aven, heavily calcited just beyond the junction with HB -> MG, this calcite's up but has been radio-located to surface. I'm pretty sure theres another calcited cross-rift towards the end too. I don't think you're going to get another entrance anywhere along here nor anywhere else in the HB series.

Our main goal is to continue digging the end and now with easier access via MG and the via-ferrata route this becomes a long evening trip. Its heading into a huge mass of blank limestone with the swallets far-far away. Also there's still pleanty of other digs around the HB series that want a good fettle but Bagshawe still doesn't seem to attract anyone other than The Eldon.

As for other entrances England's Green and Pleasant Land above the aven series would be closest to surface but nothing would be gained from this.

More information for people who attend the Derbyshire Explorers Forum at the end of Sept.

 

[pwhole]

It would be excellent if some genius could overlay the survey onto that old map.

I don't have a drawn survey, but this is the Survex model and the Barmaster's map overlaid on Google Earth. Don't think it will display any larger than this though.

 

[langcliffe]

I don't have a drawn survey, but this is the Survex model and the Barmaster's map overlaid on Google Earth. Don't think it will display any larger than this though.

View attachment 16683

Impressive!

 

[pwhole]

Here's the survey model and just the map, which may be more useful. I have dug out the proper drawn survey as a PDF but the lines are very thin, and manually matching it to Google Earth will be a real pain, and probably very faint. Maybe it's time for a mod to split the thread

Incidentally, there's been some fairly recent collapses on Hill (Earl) Rake, well west of the road and not far from the southernmost extremity of Bagshawe - roughly where the vein leaves the map bottom just above. They look a bit sketchy though, and are fenced-off. I took these in January, so not sure what's happening there now.

 

[AR]

Incidentally, there's been some fairly recent collapses on Hill (Earl) Rake, well west of the road and not far from the southernmost extremity of Bagshawe - roughly where the vein leaves the map bottom just above. They look a bit sketchy though, and are fenced-off. I took these in January, so not sure what's happening there now.

I walked the path a couple of months back and there's not been any more movement that I could see.

 

[JonP]

Earl Rake would be the "backdoor" and as Phil says not far from the current end of Bagshawe. It will be interesting to see what happens when we reach it underground.

 

[Mrs Trellis]

I have been looking at the drawn survey from the PDCi site. It dates from 1991 iirc. and this prompted my question. The description in CoPD says that the "French" (Cognac? ) southern passage ends close to Earl Rake.

 

[T pot 2]

Outlands head quarry cave (before it was filled) had a huge boulder choke that draughted very strongly, somewhere i have an eldon journal with the survey in it.
Hartle dale cave would be my suggestion for gaining access to it, however looking at the bagshaw cavern overlay survey the most south westerly passage can't be far off in getting to it.
There is also a mine shaft that may give access to the further reaches of baggers.

 

[Stoney Boy]

I'm out of the loop with the Bagshawe stuff but do you still go through the Bowl to get up there? Is there a good survey on line?

 

[Stoney Boy]

I'm out of the loop with the Bagshawe stuff but do you still go through the Bowl to get up there? Is there a good survey on line?

Remember that lad Rob digging in Walkers....Water used to come up through the floor in flood. Would make a really good digging site as is easy access.
Farmer at Hazelbadge was a loon but maybe gone nowadays.

 

[pwhole]

One of the local landowners recently gave us permission to dig out a possible collapsed shaft right on the edge of the west side of Bradwell Dale near Hill Rake, but it would still be a long way from Bagshawe - Bradwell Parish Cave probably goes further into the hill. I had a quick poke in January (with the landowner present), but with no safety it wasn't worth it then. But I'm still thinking about it.

DCA did make several attempts at communication with Hazlebadge a few years ago, but I seem to remember they came to naught. Not a lot he can do about folks going in Walkers though, if he does own it.