Tag: Ardeche

Day 6, Ardèche Trip – Midroi/Rochas/Guigonne

Team: Will, Kate, Damian, Maz, Jasmine & Scott

You may have noticed from the Ardèche reports that we are missing days 4 & 5. Kate and myself have been road tripping this holiday in our van and splintered off from the rest of the group for a couple of days to take a very slow and scenic drive through the Gorges de l’Ardeche and to take Lenny for his ‘return to the UK’ appointment with a French vet. The others caved on both days, trying a couple of different routes into Foussoubie on one day and Champclos on another -you’ll have to await the reports and images from someone else I’m afraid!

Whilst travelling through the gorges, Kate and I saw that we were going to pass the area of Midroi-Rochas-Guigonne, the fifth largest system at 7700m of passageway and the deepest trip around 175m. Rochas is the vertical side of the cave, where you can do the through trip, however it is essential (as you’ll see further in this report!) to ensure that water levels are low enough for the connection to be made as it is a crawl that can become flooded. Midroi is the more common horizontal entrance and Guigonne is another along with vers les Aments, however I’m not sure if either of these last 2 are passable for cavers at all, potentially Guigonne gets wet towards the exit from looking at the survey. With what is described in many reports as an interesting and challenging hike in/out, Kate and I loaded up and head out with Lenny on a recce mission. After some serious descent down a single track that we knew would be brutal to hike back up (not too brutal though as we ended up doing it two days in a row!), it wasn’t long before we were passing through Refuge de Gournier in the bottom of the valley and onwards to the Great Gour. This is a limestone pavement carved into the bottom of the cliff that gives you a nice walk above river level, before becoming steeper and iron handrails introduced to help the scramble across at the end. Just before the end of the scramble, the way on slants off to river level, and we were unable to continue due to not having wellies and the river levels being pretty high – at this point, you must step into the violently flowing Ardèche river with not many holds at all and hope the water doesn’t carry you off! As we had Lenny, and neither of us had wellies, this was were we turned around although unknowingly we were only a couple of hundred metres or so from the Midroi entrance. We regathered Lenny, he was tethered to a small shrub on the Grand Gour whilst we looked at the traverse, and then began our hike back out up the valley. We planned to return on the next day with the rest of the team to try again.

We were a little kit heavy as we had a tackle bag with ropes and crabs, and another with the emergency kit and an additional bit of rope just in case (we were learning from our previous outings!). Due to the hike in and out, all but Jasmine opted to hike in clothing and change into cave kit river side. Kate was feeling brave enough to join us for her first KCC trip, and she instantly proved her worth carrying her own kit and the rescue kit all the way, and juggling 2 bags along the traverse – I had the other 2 bags. We’d discussed bringing the S.S.Gournier also, but as we’d already packed the ropes to traverse le Grand Lac, we opted to leave it as a) it was additional kit to carry in and out, and negotiate across the traverse, and b) it may be required again before the end of the holiday! Hint, hint! (Where was it last used?) A wise decision definitely, as the hike back out is not the most pleasant, but this is where I proved my worth and loaded up with my bag, kit bag, and rescue bag to give the others a bit of relief on the way up! Kate often refers to me as her ‘mountain Yak’! Damian had volunteered to be our call out and not cave, but joined us on our hike in and then he continued along the river bank whilst we were entertaining ourselves.

The weather was lovely, and the walk in was quickly accomplished, finding ourselves on the Grand Gour in no time gearing up for the traverse that turned Kate and I away the day prior. It was immediately obvious that, overnight, river levels had dropped some what and the crossing wasn’t looking anywhere near as treacherous as the day before! The team all made light work of the crossing, and quickly scrambled between the boulders to gain the shore on the other side. Following the various descriptions we had, it wasn’t long before we found a large entrance that we thought to be Midroi, only one issue, totally flooded waist to chest deep from the get go. Jasmine was super keen and donning a wetsuit, so she was nominated/volunteered and took off into the flooded entrance, fully swimming from 10/15 metres in. It wasn’t long before she returned to inform us that the ceiling becomes very low and sump’s not far in. Surely this can’t be Midroi?! Where is the the Grand Lac?! Where are the ridiculous number of bolt/anchors along the right wall to traverse the Grand Lac?! Surely this can’t really be that flooded?! As we quickly revised the descriptions again, looking for any key detail we may have missed, we were certain this must be the place. Some previous trips from other clubs reported that they found the cave to be sumped and had to retreat, but all had spoke of finding the Grand Lac not far inside the entrance, its supposedly some 30m across and can be crossed by swimming, by boat, or by rigging a ridiculously long traverse along the right hand side – which being the rope geek I am I opted for! A few descriptions had said it can be difficult to spot the entrance to Midroi (which we hadn’t experienced) and that it was 250m from the end of the iron handrails at the boulder, and at an elevation of 85m. Scott, Maz and I set off back retracing our steps to pace out the distance, and scour the side of the cliff for any other possibilities. Luckily, I had my Garmin watch on so could very accurately walk 250m then climb to exactly 85m in that location, although it did take me about an hour before realising! After almost 2 hours, we’d found nothing at all and had searched from the start of the boulder, right along the shore to around 350/400m and up to an elevation of 95m. There was only the one entrance, it had to be this. As I returned, I’d found the others already back together, and whilst we were away Jasmine and tried to dig out around the large boulders at the entrance that were causing a dam. Actually, she’d made some really good progress and looking along the walls inside the cave you could see it had dropped around a foot whilst we’d been out searching. After some further digging with the aid of Scott and Maz, Jasmine again set off inside to see if we could make more progress. Keen to wash my oversuit from the previous trips and being teased by Kate with the “if you will I will” phrase, I followed, and then the others followed me. We all made it roughly around 100m, getting fully drenched, before the passageway splits with a high level branching off to the left that quickly becomes a crawl and didn’t look like it went very far, with the lower level leading onwards into a smaller passageway. Before now it was possible to avoid swimming, but the floor of the cave was so slippy with mud/silt that it was impossible to hold your footing and you may as well swim! From here on, the water temperature changed and you could tell it was much deeper, and unable to touch the bottom. On Jasmine’s first swim in, this way on was almost flooded to the ceiling, leaving only a couple of inches air space at the top, and as she was already fully swimming with no knowledge of the bottom Jasmine opted to retreat to us and no push into the space – a wise choice as only a couple of metres inside and it was fully sumped. When we all returned together, the water here had dropped around a foot and a half and again Jasmine swam over this time into the opening, whilst I’d scrambled around the edge in an attempt to remain somewhat dry to support her onward attempts with words of wisdom. Again, still sumped. We retreated a little and explored what we could before exiting for another change riverside followed by the hike back out. Damian was ahead of us making it back to the vehicles first and kindly waited to ensure we all got back safely. It must have been some sight for him on his return down the river to where he’d left us, as the Midroi entrance was promptly spewing out cave water that’s been trapped for who knows how long, down and along the river bank into the stunningly coloured Ardèche river!

As we were walking back through the Refuge de Gournier, Maz took some time to explore and reminisce on his years here with groups as a teacher. He found some information boards, and wooden markers to indicate the previous flood levels, some very recently. Everything suddenly made sense! It’s no secret that the Ardèche floods through winter, in fact on this exact trip at the end of March we’d experienced some horrific rain when travelling over and in the first few days, so knew the water levels were up. Where Maz was now stood, holding his hand above his head saying “this is where it flooded in 19** and here in 18**” we were probably about 10 metres ish above the Grand Gour and in turn also above the level of the entrance to Midroi. So when this area floods, and it doesn’t need to be catastrophic, the traverse on the Grand Gour (and probably the Gour itself!) completely disappears. The entrance to Midroi will flood and sump to the ceiling, washing in a load of sand, silt, and flood debris carried down the river. When the levels drop, the Midroi remains completely flooded until the entrance has had a good old digging out to make it somewhat friendly again before normal service can resume in the active months, maybe by a local speleology club or guides that use the cave? Perhaps they’ll be relieved this year to see that, thanks to Jasmine and other KCC helpers, the works already been started! We certainly need to visit again in peak season to see if our theories are correct.

Write up and pics by Will

Ardèche trip, Day 3 – Aven des Pebres

Team: Damian, Chris, Tom, Maz, Scott, Jasmine & Will (write up by Will, photos by Will & Tom)

This one was a little harder to find but our convoy of 3 vehicles navigated the rocky roads of rural Ardèche without much difficulty and found where we needed to be. A quick kit up and off we went, following the description. It was evident by now that descriptions and more importantly topo’s were very vague and often distances and rope lengths were just ball park figures. It wasn’t long before we’d come to a halt at a crossroads and cavers dispersed down the off shoots around us on a hunt for the entrance. Tom was first to holla up, so we all regathered and made for the sound of his voice. Entrance found, day 3 begins.

After yesterday’s retreat, I’d come prepared and so set off leading, straight onto a couple of slides which we rigged but later realised wasn’t necessary and would have made our day a bit easier but when at the top of the slides, it’s not totally convincing that you’ll get back up – they’re that slick. After a couple of easy down climbs and short passageway, we soon came upon the 31m pitch, which worked down through a series of re-belays that required some problem solving. In total, we used resin’d anchors for the most (a nice reminder of home for the team!), spits, slinged naturals, bolts, and threads. A true continental adventure! Initially, the decent can seem a little daunting and exposed, but confidence is restored as you work down and find options a plenty for rigging and all solid. I guess this is why the route descriptions and topo’s are so vague, because people take what they take and use what they use to get down. Going from the info Tom had, we’d over packed on rope length, but still found ourselves short on occasion. One of our previous pitches had some length left over, so Tom went with his knife to shorten it and repurpose the spare on another pitch further down. After the main pitch, again, we found ourselves short at the final pitch so as we were still spread out along the many re-belays on the main pitch we passed the message up for someone to go for the rope we’d used back on the entrance slides that we didn’t necessarily need. Damian and Chris were bringing up the rear and so retreated for the rope, and after ensuring we’d got it and that we would be able to climb the slide safely, they opted to exit early. Tom and I set to conjuring our very make shift last pitch set up, and then passed back the best way to work through it. Only small, around 5-6m, but awkward if you don’t have the right length of rope! After touching down, I set off to find the way on, a short scramble up into a decorated chamber, then a low crawl to the left down and through a large gour pool that I could only just about star fish across to stay dry, a slide down some flowstone, squeeze through some stals, low crawl over a deeper gour pool through a small opening and… WOW! I stood up, headtorch on full, quick look around, and then set off back as fast as I could to the others shouting its the best one of the trip yet! Possibly an early statement to make, as in reality each of our trips so far have been equally incredible but very different. Jasmine was next to touch down and she was instantly infected with my excitement and told me to take her to what I’d found. We worked through the crawls and squeezes and into the main chamber at the bottom. There was an in situ rope to the right leading up to a ledge so I quickly jumped on it and gained the view point. By now the others had made their way to the main chamber and some began to follow up behind me, others exploring the chamber. After the first ledge, there’s more ropes leading up around and through the calcite formations to a higher balcony over looking the whole chamber. I climbed a couple more pitches to another ledge, where I could just about see Tom and Maz walking amongst the huge formations. Tom translated from the description that the climb was to not much else and the view wasn’t going to beat my current positioning. I ab’d back down to the first ledge, where Jasmine and Scott overtook me and Maz was just gaining. Maz took some time here to admire the place whilst I descended, and Tom climbed to join Maz. Scott climbed to where I had been, and Jasmine began to work her way all the way to the top balcony. I started to explore the rest of the chamber whilst Tom and Maz ab’d down to join me. Before long, Scott was with us also and we watched Jasmine work her way back down through the in situ ropes. The whole cave is roughly 90m deep, and at the bottom is just huge chamber ceiling roughly 30m high filled with massive formations, floor to ceiling columns, and then it slopes down to the left which can be scrambled some way until you come to a ledge with view to a huge pool with crystal clear water in the bottom some 15 metres below. Tom and I searched for a way down, and whilst we were certain you could jump in the pool and survive, there didn’t appear to be a way down or up. The description says there’s another pitch, which we couldn’t obviously find, but had no rope left even if we had.

Once we’d had our fill, we headed out as we’d entered, with Scott de-rigging. Soon enough we were back on the surface without too many dramas, and hiking up the hill back to the vehicles. Day 3 completed, I think we’ll all sleep tonight!

Ardeche trip – Day 2, Grotte Saint-Marcel

Team A: Damian, Chris

Team B: Tom, Scott, Jasmine, Maz & Will

Thanks to some pre-trip planning, Tom had negotiated with his local contact to collect the keys for various entrances into Grotte Saint-Marcel. This huge system comprises of kilometre after kilometre of huge open passageway filled with formations to stroll along. There are 5 ‘Networks’ in total, and today we worked our way through most of Network 1 with Team A focusing on the horizontal options and Team B doing the same plus a look at the series of SRT pitches that connect Network 1 to Network 4.

The trip started with spirits high, despite yesterday’s ‘warm up’ cave that would easily be granted a Grade 4 difficulty or higher back home. Break them in easy, ey Tom?! From the parking, both teams head for the natural entrance to Saint-Marcel which was a relatively easy 10-15 minute walk downhill to a large natural gated opening in the wood. Once inside, we locked the door behind and a brief 20m stoop opened up immediately to a huge open passageway. Team A quickly sped off, whilst Team B took a more leisurely approach taking in all of the surroundings and comparing the differences to yesterday’s excursion. Maz was immediately satiated as there were bats all over the ceiling and formations, at one point we had to be super careful not to head butt them off the ceiling! The next couple of hours were filled with easy romping down expansive passageways sometimes filled with formations, sometimes not. On occasion, we were guided by a cordon or had to navigate around huge formations and gour pools. We were treated with both filled, flowing and empty gour pools, and some were so deep you’d disappear if you hopped in! It wasn’t too long before things became ‘showcavey’ with concreted walkways, cabling, lights (sadly turned off as currently closed to the public), stairways, etc. We found the showcave entrance, where a huge steel staircase leads to a concreted slope and steps back to the surface. An obvious junction, here both teams made the final onward and exit plans before pressing on with adventures. So far, team A had been leading the way, with team B trailing 50 or so metres behind. We’d all regather when passing formations or obvious areas we felt we must photograph, before moving on. We carried on this them whilst we worked through more passageway, around Boas corner where the passageway takes an obvious 90 degree right hand turn, and if you put yourself in the very outer corner of the bend, you can capture both passageways leading in opposite directions – so we did, with a few cavers for scale!

After more of the same, we saw team A working their way off to the left, but I spotted a short climb up into another huge passageway leading off to the right. So team B opted to explore this first. More huge, expansive and decorated passageway to go at and so we did. We found our way to a lake indicated on the survey as such and could see that up ahead was more, and more, and more of the same. Literally, we could have spent days down there. And this was only Network 1, of 5. Scott and Jasmine were ahead exploring whilst Scott, Maz and myself quickly took a knee and a team meet. We could see from the survey that the way team A went quickly turned vertical with not much else on offer, where as the way we were heading was more of the same horizontal we’d been in for the last 3 and a half hours. We opted to pull back and rejoin team A, in a hope they would continue the exploration we had started, whilst we could have a look at the vertical stuff we’d carried 4 tackle sacks with us for. As expected, we soon found team A retreating from the chasm they had found, but had found our first pitch head for us. Clearly, they were spent and ready to make for their exit, so after we said our goodbyes they set off and Tom and I scrambled the formations in front of us to find said chasm. It certainly didn’t disappoint and the view was immense, more than once I crept to an edge and made it know we certainly had no rope long enough for that way on!

After a little bit of searching through boulders, whilst being directed by Tom, I found the first pitch head and I think it was fair to say I was nominated for rigging. I think the lack of CNCC resin’d anchors didn’t impress the others. I didn’t bring any threads, but after our Estevan-Barbette outing yesterday I did through a couple of spits in my bag, so I quickly knocked up the first ‘Y’ hang with a spit and a dyneema sling (courtesy of Maz) poked through an 8mm thread. I had no idea where I was going, Tom said an 8m ab and then a 15m climb but that was the extent of the description. So I worked my way down through the boulders on rope to where I thought I should be before coming off rope and crawling between boulders, and up a 15m climb as instructed. Convinced I’d nailed it, I came around another huge boulder to find Tom and Maz, at the top of the first pitch waiting for their turn to ab. I relayed my cock up to Scott who was following, and he relayed to Jasmine behind him. Once Jasmine (now in front of me) said off rope, I quickly whipped it back up from behind her and started ab-ing in a different direction over boulders. This time correct! We worked our way through the first pitch, followed by a short scramble to a ledge for the second pitch. This looked way bigger than it actually was, with a slope of flowstone that then dropped to who knows where. Again no anchors to suitably please my partners, so I knocked up another ‘Y’ hang this time fully natural with 2 slings and worked down the slope. I found a loop of rope tied through the flowstone and so opted for a quick re-belay before going over the edge I still couldn’t see the bottom of. Once rigged and passed, the floor was only a few metres away so before long I was down and the rest of the team in tow. We were now stood at the top of steep sloping breakdown in a large chamber with a few exposed edges. We scrambled around the top and then found some in-situ ropes. A 7metre climb to a ‘Y’ hang, pass the ‘Y’ hang onto the next rope up 8m through a deviation to another ‘Y’ hang. Normally no issue, but this one had a number of them! The rope was pretty old and caked in clay like mud, the ‘Y’ hangs didn’t look great and the only one we could see was rigged with someone’s shoe lace. Again, no one seemed keen, so off I went hoping the French use strong shoe laces. Whilst I was only a few metres off the ground, a fall here would of resulted in a 30-40m steep slide down, hitting a lot of hard things on the way. Needless to say I wasn’t moving quickly! Half way up the first rope there was a loud pop from the anchor and I dropped an inch or so, but as I was mid move it made more sense to push up to the ‘Y’ hang where I could see a ledge I could just and so stand on and inspect the anchor further. It didn’t look good, and one of the bolts had moved on me during the pop. It wasn’t possible from here to see the next ‘Y hang as it was obstructed by a shelf about 8 metres above me, but I could see the deviation half way up. I could also see the ridiculous drop to my left that had now come into view, or rather I could see the bottom of it at all. I stuck the next rope in my chest ascender and took in some slack and quickly learned the way on was a swing over this drop and up to the rebelay. The question in my mind now was do I want to do that, on a sh*t rope, on ascenders, with doubt in the anchors and this time no vision at all. Even if I did get up this rope, there was a further 3 pitches ahead before we even entered Network 4, and I wasn’t being followed so that would all have been on me. No chance! I very slowly ab’d down the clay rope back to Tom and Maz, before shouting over the discoveries to Jasmine and Scott. Whilst they worked their way back il the ropes and through the boulder pile, I scrambled down the sloped breakdown to find the huge hole I saw from that ledge above. Another little peek over from the other side and still I couldn’t see the bottom at all and I was now 30-40m lower than my previous viewpoint!

Once we’d all made it back up and Tom had de-rigged, we had a quick snack and kit sort before heading back through everything we’d already come through. Again, head torches were flashing low on battery, and we were all pretty low on battery also – a good job we hadn’t made it through the pitches to Network 4 as we’d still be in there now! Refuelled, we were soon climbing the steel staircase at the bottom to the showcase entrance before hiking up the ramp to the door, which we were praying team A had left open as planned. Keys located, door open, sun in the sky when we surfaced. What a fantastic way to finish day 2! Surely we must return in future years to explore more of these networks?

Write up by Will, photos by Will and Chris (Chris did the better more professional looking ones!)

Ardeche trip 2025 – first trip

Estevan – Barbette through trip

Team: Tom, Scott, Jasmine, Damian, Maz & Will

After a few days of various travel plans, we all arrived at the correct place for the first adventure of the trip. Initially Tom had sold this to us as a nice easy warm up, a single entrance pitch followed by much walking amongst formations with the odd crawl in between – perhaps a statement that may come back to haunt him!

A short walk in found us quickly at an entrance, where we eagerly dived in, clearly showing we’d all spent far too long in cars, planes or both to get here! The problem was that we’d actually found the exit of the through trip (Barbette cave), not the entrance. A brief down climb through some narrow passageway finds you in a beautifully decorated chamber with many off shoots, which would be the theme for the rest of the trip also. After a quick recce about and some photos, we headed back out to find the actual entrance, which was only a further few minutes up the track.

Estevan had one of the tightest entrances I think I’ve seen, one which almost turned some team members away from the get go! Warm up cave was it?! Tom lead the way and quickly had the pitch rigged – there isn’t the luxury of CNCC resin’d anchor bolts over here, in fact the topo/description also isn’t what we’re used to, so there was definitely a lot of ‘have a go and see’ going on. Once inside and down the 8m ab, we were in possibly the largest chamber of the day. When I say beautifully decorated, there are so many formations that you struggle to navigate your way through them in places. Columns easily of 2-5m diameter everywhere, millions of stal’s, huge heli’s, it really had everything and everywhere. We were breezing past formations as if they weren’t there, but had we been back in the Dales they would have been the focal point and probably named. I can’t stress enough, from start to finish, they were everywhere, and the colour/variations of colour were incredible.

Having completed most of the main area, we found the ‘Jonction Barbette’ sign which indicates the start of the crawl and onward travel for the through trip. Remember though, this is a warm up trip and nothing too serious… Well, this was where I really thought something was off, because normally the room doesn’t go silent waiting for me to lead the crawls but here I was out front having a go. Route finding was relatively straight forward, the squeezes and flat out crawls were self explanatory, and the decorated chambers in between were well cordoned to keep cavers away from the formations showing the onward direction nicely. Occasionally we were thrown a choice of directions, I followed my nose, sometimes to a dead end or a viewing platform outlined with more cordon – someone’s certainly been very busy at some point, as the signage was also quite impressive! After a few more squeezes to navigate as a team to get everyone through, we were in another huge decorated chamber and quickly found the final onward crawl section that linked back to the first chamber we visited going in the exit right at the start, literally 25-30m away max. Just one problem, it was tight, proper tight, and clear why the route description we had called this the crux of the trip. Tom had a look and didn’t seem keen, I thought I’d found a sneaky bypass but sadly it quickly choked. Our only other option was to work our way back through the series of squeezes and crawls we’d navigated so far and we were about 3 hours in and all getting pretty tired. It was noticeably hotter in this cave, I had a tshirt and long sleeved tshirt on under my oversuit and was dripping. Some of the team had an undersuit on under theirs and they all regretted it! I followed Scott into the crux crawl as I could see that where he was 3 or so metres in it was ever so slightly wider, maybe by an inch or 2. From there, I watched Scott fight his way forward through some gnarly looking stuff including some flooded pools and a bit where he only just made it with fully exhaling. Once we established that there was the ability to turn around, in the worst case, I let Jasmine pass by me as she was chomping at my heels and I knew this was way more her territory than mine! What a pair of legends, truly awesome to watch them take it to that next level! Behind me, I think Tom and Maz had already made the decision that they weren’t coming and to make for the entrance pitch again. Scott’s final words echoed through the crawl that he thought I’d make it, and that Tom and Maz wouldn’t enjoy it, but should give it a try and I’ll be honest I wasn’t keen! I also had 2 team mates that had just given everything to get to the final 25/30 metres to find out they had to go back, de-rig and at the bottom of the entrance pitch was all of our SRT kits we’d stripped after the ab. So I retreated from the crawl and rejoined Tom and Maz. After yelling our intentions through the crawl, we then realised that Tom’s headtorch was really low as was mine, and neither of our backups were working, and we had all of those squeezes and crawls to navigate. We all understood the assignment and after about 30 mins and all losing a third of our body weight in sweat, we were at the bottom of the entrance pitch donning harnesses for the climb out. Up the chaps went while I bagged up the other SRT kits and then de-rigged on my way out.

We surfaced to a full on thunderstorm and torrential rain that had started almost immediately after we went in, which we clearly hadn’t had any effects of inside thankfully! The short walk in meant we were back at the vehicles in less than 10 minutes and it certainly wasn’t more than that again before we were all changed and inside out of the wet. Whilst we were on this trip, our final team member Chris had arrived so tomorrow we will be at full capacity.

Although by no means was this a warm up, it certainly was an incredible cave. If the formations on display were anything to go by, we’re really in for a treat or two this trip, and if that means the helmet has to come off a couple of times then so be it. Our campaign has well and truly begun, stay tuned for the next one!

(Write up and pics by Will)