Swildon's / PGS remembered

Sid

Member
On June 5th 1996 the first trip connecting Swildon?s Hole and Priddy Green Sink took place. To commemorate the 20th anniversary Tony Jarratt?s log for that day tells the events of that fine evening both for caving and the as he describes it the ?Glorious weather? we enjoyed.

Swildon?s Hole / Priddy Green Sink 5/6/96

Ivan Sandford, Rich Blake, Mike Willett, Ade (Adrian Hole), Brian Woodward

At last after all the effort put in during the last four decades the through trip had been opened up. Fred Davies and Ray Mansfield were invited along but could?nt make it but Brian Woodward instantly took the afternoon off work to mend his car and arrived on the Green at 6.15pm in a mixture of canoeing/caving kit! At 6.35pm Ivan and I entered Swildons after leaving our fees and an amusing note in Robin Mains box. Soon after this Rich, Mike, Ade and Brian entered Priddy Green ? having also left Robin money and amusing note. There was no one else in the cave and Ivan and I pressed on to Tratmans Temple when we parted company as I intended to dive Sump 2 and 3 while Ivan scooped the Blue Pencil route. When I arrived at Sump 2 and started kitting up my high pressure hose blew ? having been bent too far in the container.

After several frustrating minutes of indecision I decided it was a case of ?shit or bust? and, doning weights mask and hood free dived Sump 2 with relative ease. Sump 3 took two goes as I took too long to negotiate the initial low section on my first try. I emerged in Four extremely relieved and elated and rushed, whooping, down the streamway to meet Ivan at Cowsh Aven. He had made excellent time through St Pauls Series. About five minutes later a glimmer of light and noises from above heralded(?) the approach of Rich abseiling down the aven to join us. Handshakes and congratulations were the order of the day as Ade, Mike and the now scarred and ?Priddy Green shocked? Brian joined us. Fags were lit and Amoretto (liquid bang!) passed around to celebrate the occasion before we continued on our separate ways ? Rich, Mike and Ade back out via Blue Pencil, Brian free diving sumps 3 and 2 and Ivan and I struggling up the almost 500ft of desperation to Priddy Green. All went well and after a fag break in Top Aven we squeezed our way up the ?interesting? vertical 10ft or so into Tin Can Alley, Priddy Green Sink. From here some 35ft or so of superb keyhole crawl (and a damned pool put there as a ?feature? by the lads ? bastards) led us to Stoned Bat Aven. It was very strange to arrive here from a different direction! Feeling in superb form I took the time to wind up the bang wire and take out the explosives while Ivan carried the drill. The wire in Barrel was also removed and a steady slog made to the entrance pipe where a bottle of Champagne was found hanging on the bottom rung of the ladder!

On emerging from the entrance at 9.10pm we were surrounded by the lads and admirers / photographers consisting of Becca, Andy Sparrow, Paul Stillman and Anthony Butcher. Lots of photos were taken and ?bubbly? consumed. The occasion was marred only by the attitude of Robin Main who had taken the ?comical notes? to be a slur on his taking money of people to go down Swildons. We apologized as best as we could (Edited).

In glorious weather we went on to the Hunters to celebrate in the traditional style in the company of who had worked bloody hard on the connection - Jim Hanwell, Fred Davies, Prew (Brian Prewer), Dave Turner etc. A noisy and excitable Wednesday night resulted.
A superb trip with good company and a happy ending to a difficult but absorbing winter project.

2 hours 45 minutes
Tony Jarratt

Two days later Tony did the trip in reverse to recover kit. His log suggests he was not in any hurry to return!

Links to photos of the team

https://goo.gl/jxonPv
https://goo.gl/A5cAYL
https://goo.gl/a62Ohb
https://goo.gl/iLsnGf

Link to Tony?s log books http://www.mcra.org.uk/logbooks/index.php?dir=jrat%2F
 
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