Cussey Pot
During Lockdown 2020 a new hole was spotted to draught bigger and stronger than any cave in the Peak. We dug it open and this is what happened....
Full description of the trip can be viewed here.
The current survey can be downloaded from here.
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- Written by: Rob Eavis
- Hits: 1689
Team: JoeB, RobE
A mixture of work, bad backs, and general malaise meant it was just me and Soulless Joe this evening. We were really keen to get back into the new chamber, survey it, push the inlet above, and maybe have a little dig at the wet way on. Two people was fine for that task and we were keen.
To aid inserting myself into the inlet I chose to wear a furry. Not just any furry though; my brand new Misty Mountain one which I was really keen to try out. Joe, as always, sporting his wetsuit. Prebeers enjoyed and off we went. We had a bunch of sandbags to take in, as we figured this may help with building a wall to stack behind, but without a tackle bag I stuck them inside my oversuit, which along with my phone, survey gear, and other bits n bobs made me even more inelegant than normal.
We got to Inglorious and set off towards Loper Lust, Joe in front. I was wittering on about some random crap when I hear Joe say “It’s a bit wet”. My mind snaps into gear and realise there’s no draught. Shit, it’s sumped. The heavy downpour over the weekend has obviously left its mark on LL, even though the rest of the cave was in pretty normal conditions. Shit. Joe floats into the crawl to inspect whilst I wait at the pool at the start. After some spluttering he informs me he’s reached the last airbell and it’s totally sumped from there onwards. What to do…? Forwards from there is the tightest bit, but it’s only maybe 3m long, and it quickly slopes up beyond. We tentatively discuss the situation, each not wanting to play our cards too soon. It was pretty clear to me that Joe was keener than me. I blame that on my furry suit and mass of paraphernalia hanging off me, glasses included, but I’ve a feeling that ball size probably came into it too. We um’d and ar’d a bit longer, then Joe came back. We turned around and instantly regretted it. On the crawl we discuss that this is how all good adventures start, with an opportunity to flee but where the fearless continue. I point out that’s also how stupid people die. We feel marginally better…
Now not even 8pm I came up with a list of things we could waste some time doing. This started with ascending into the mined section at the far end of Inglorious to have a poke at some new bits, which Joe had never been up. We first dug into a small, natural bedding plane which lead to the left to a dead end, and right back into Inglorious. We then climb up above Inglorious into a nicely decorated chamber but with no possible ways on we retreat.
Smoke testing from Shattered Dreams rift into the higher levels
Next on the list (which I was hoping to do on the way out anyway) was a smoke bomb exercise, testing to see if the draught in some of the passages higher up in Cussey comes from the lower stuff or from somewhere else. The main hope was a crack in the back of Poetry Corner, which kinda points SW towards the new divers’ bit, so hot territory. Having allowed Joe ample time to make his way up I set off two big pellets at the far eastern end of the Shattered Dreams rift and follow him up. Heading up the pitch was fine, but when I got to the top smoke was pouring out of all the cracks like tendrils and by the time I was in the squeeze visibility was very low! I stumble my way to Joe and indeed Poetry Chamber was filling up nicely from all directions too, strongly suggesting that the draught is all from Shattered Dreams. Rubbish, but useful nonetheless.
Out by 21:15, we console ourselves with beer in the Moon and discuss the great adventure that we knowingly walked away from. Maybe next week....
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- Written by: Joe Buck
- Hits: 1764
Kristian B, Rob M, Rob E and Joe B
Four of us met in the usual spot for another mid-week slop extravaganza in Vulgarious. Those of us who’d remembered the five Ps supped a beer as Rob 2 described how terrible diving is (I don’t think that was his intention), and we were soon headed over to the lid.
Up until this point the dig has managed to avoid too many corners and sharp protrusions, but after the last few sessions it had reached a dog leg which could mean a lot more work and bodies would be required. Rob elected to take a stint at the back to prove how easy the hauling was and that four was enough people. I took pole position at the face, with Kristian just behind me, and Rob 2 as a mid-point hauling rope changeover. My strategy was just to lie on my back with the tray on my front and just throw chunks over my head, trying not to fill my eyes with slop in the process. I’d then slide this down myself to my feet and worm my way back towards Kristian where, by the sounds of it, I would then cover him in filth as I kicked it towards him. This went well and we were managing to maintain a good rhythm with trays arriving just as required.
After about 3 or 4 m progress, the tantalising sound of trickling water and a bit of an echo could be heard ahead. The passage started to rise and open out to the point that I could start to progress just by ploughing my hands into the mud and making room as I went. After another few meters of this it popped out into a small chamber around 3m high and similar widths. At this point Kristian had started to grow concerned after I hadn’t replied for a while and he started to head through with the others hot on his tail. After pats on the back from my comrades to celebrate my first proper(ish) find, we began to look around for ways on.
We immediately spied the continuation of the passage at floor level which was an eye-hole with about an inch air space above the water and was generally uninviting. We inspected the roof, desperate not to have to investigate the previously spotted misery eye-hole. Mostly the roof is choked with no obvious way on, however, there was a small rift which could be accessed. Not wanting to trash any more neoprene we focussed on floor level. Rob had a quick dunk in the continuation, and concluded that whilst not ideal, it was drafting and therefore not sumped. It was floated (sorry) that if we could lower the water level then it may be possible to dig. The Robs set about shifting rocks in the chamber to clear a channel, whilst Kristian was lowering the floor in Vulgarious so the water would have somewhere to flow. The Robs were having an ordeal removing the rocks, to which Rob 1 suggested I have a go as “he’s really strong”. Much like every time I’m asked to open a jar, Rob 2 and I fumbled and slipped on it and left royally defeated. It was slightly disappointing the way on only looked to be getting more vulgar, however we vowed to return with a hammer and crowbar to tackle these next time and hopefully get the water running through more easily. There is plenty of stacking space, but it would probably benefit from the sand bags to contain the slop.
In the interest of determining what else to bring next time, Rob inspected up into the rift to see what may be required. We cowered at the side as he began to start kicking rocks down. It tightened significantly, however Rob suggested there was a vadose inlet at the side which is worth further investigation - maybe with an oversuit. Time was ticking on, so we made a hasty retreat through the now very spacious Vulgarious and back to the cars for beers and medals. From my perspective, I was ecstatic to add a minor contribution to the cave and excited to continue, even if this isn’t the way on. Same time next week?
- Details
- Written by: Kristian Brook
- Hits: 1891
Everyone bailed. I met Rob in the dogging park at the agreed time, expecting a 'proper' cussy digging trip where he informed me that Luke had bailed due to catching covid and Jon had some other urgent business. This would mean the digging would be postponed and we would survey up to a boulder choke that Rob think is heading toward the Stoney Master Cave. Beers consummed we changed into wetsuits and headed down. This would be my first time down Inglorious Bastards and through Loperamide Lust and it did not disappoint. Lovely slick mid made for easy progress in a wetsuit and I must thank the diggers for finding such a lovely bit of cave.
Rob Calibrating, photo by Kristian
After reaching the base ladder below Doom, Rob Calibrated the disto and we set off for the main mine levels surveying as we went. We arrived at the large mine level where I had a piss and we shot many splays all over the shop as rob enjoys data. We headed down a side passage which name I cannot remember and passed though a very pretty bit of breezeblock construction to entered 'the wet bit' where my willy got wet and I will never forgive Rob. A bit of hip height wetness was surveyed and we managed to work our way through a lower section (thank god) and we were at this boulder choke.
Ladder below Doom (Can't be bothered to rotate it), photo by Kristian
No evidence of miners however there is a lot of dramatic sheering in the rock as well as natural development. These were all Rob's observations as I did not care. I just wanted to see his lead. It turned out to be a small hole at the end of a rift with quite a sizable echo beyond it. The constriction requires you to leave the floor at the end of this rifty section of choke. The hole is a slit to your right and is in typical fashion just small enough to allow for a little wiggle room if your fully exhaled but the constriction is just long enough that you might run out of breath whilst still in it. Rob's thinking of going back with some bang for it. The echo suggests about 15m of space to me leading upwards so where it goes we don't know but it could be caverns measureless to man. Rob had a look at another lead in the choke but it did not look as promising.
Record time out with no drama besides a nose dive by myself with a side of whiplash into the loper duck. We got out, got washed, and had a quick pint in the Moon before heading home to our respective duties.
Good trip. Going again Wednesday.
Your Author post Loper, photo by Rob
- Details
- Written by: Rob Eavis
- Hits: 2430
Warning
Many parts of the cave are tight and loose and a return trip from Doom is a strenuous undertaking, especially with tackle bags. Rescue from anywhere beyond the entrance rift in either direction would prove difficult.
Entrance
The entrance is located in a small tree-lined enclosure opposite the entrance to Eyam Hall car park on the opposite side of the New Close Road and to the west of Delph Close. The lid requires a large Derbyshire key (requires a 90 degree turn/marked on lid in marker pen) and must be closed when underground which can be done from inside. The entrance pitch is a 12m hading rift with scaffolding at the top.
Time Warp and Rocky Horror
Once on the floor east leads to a squeeze along the left wall at floor level into a small ante-chamber roofed by a large boulder. A hole in the corner leads to Nomenca Rift, a 6m down climb to a small chamber with stacked rocks from the dig. A 6m down climb through a scaffold boulder choke (Nomenca Choke) leads to a squeeze at floor level which quickly opens out to where you can regather yourself at the top of NCA Pitch. The pitch starts as a tight rift, a sideways thrutch on good ledges leads to a 5m down climb to a gulley which can be followed down to the pitch head. Here the shaft opens up and a 10m abseil leads to the start of Time Warp, a large rift passage 15m long which ends in a large chamber floored with boulders. Only one route down can be descended at present a tight rift (Tight’un) which ends too tight in shatter rock. Straight ahead in Time Warp a climb up and over the choke leads to Black Rift which is a choked, clean washed pothole. A roped traverse over the top leads to Walsernice which continues for a further 20m, all ways on are choked except for a rift in the floor at the entrance which can be descended for 8m until too tight. Time Warp Aven stretches up for 20m to a choke at the top.
The main route to Rocky Horror is via a short down climb between boulders next to Black Rift. This leads to the Movie Room, a small chamber between boulders. Various routes head off but all are choked except for one in the far corner, a short climb up and down leads to a descending passage. At the far end a duck through boulders leads to the head of Rocky Horror Pitch (15m) through large boulders following a solid back wall. The pitch ends in a large chamber with evidence of T’owd Man. A squeeze down at the base of the pitch followed by a squeeze under a boulder leads to several unstable chambers/voids (The Gloom Room) which heads close to Diceman in Glebe. Back at the top of the Rocky Horror pitch, a squeeze between boulders (not obvious) leads down to a muddy chamber. Halfway down the climb a flat out crawl on the right leads to further chambers and rifts which also come close to Diceman in Glebe.
Shattered Dreams and Inglorious Bastards
Back at the base of the entrance pitch, west leads along a large rift choked with boulders at floor level. A traverse line takes the best route across on ledges and at the far end a tight rift aided with wooden stemples (Coconut Airways) drops for 4m to a further squeeze to a small chamber lined with boulders. A route up the boulders leads to a pretty chamber (Poetry Corner), which is a dead-end. The way on is down between boulders in the floor to a further squeeze which leads to a 3m down climb on flowstone to the top of Shattered Dreams Choke. A crawl can be followed to a too tight rift but following the choke down a further 4m (beware loose boulders) leads to the very tight Shattered Dreams Squeeze (aided with hand-line). Beyond the squeeze is a 4m climb down (careful of straws) which leads to the pitch proper (12m). At the base of the pitch a climb up and over boulders to the East leads to Pick Axe Rift, 8m deep and choked at the bottom. Heading west at the bottom of the pitch various holes head off but all are choked except for one at the far western end which is the start of Inglorious Bastards (careful of straws and loose boulders). The pitch (18m) starts as a funnel of boulders and mud which soon opens to the main shaft of impressive proportions. At the base of the pitch a bedding crawl (Black Draught) can be followed for 10m to a choke, whilst a rope up in the far corner leads up to T’owd Man workings and a further blind climbing shaft and internal shaft. At the eastern end of the chamber a crawl through mud leads to a squeeze down against a boulder which is Loperamide Lust. This can be followed as a crawl which is flat out in places for 20m to the Connection with Doom and the Wet West Caverns. This connection can become impassable in very wet weather.
Survey available here.
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- Written by: Ben Shannon
- Hits: 1902
Rob E, Jon P, Joe B, Ben S & Fabian E
I sit down for lunch at work to a message from Rob. “Bring everything and a wetsuit if you have one, I have some options”
I normally pack so that I can go straight from work; but as I hate being cold I raced home on the strike of 4.30 to grab my wetsuit and made my way to the usual watering hole, which happened to contain the entire population of Eyam. In a shock turn of events it was decided to forego the digging tonight and go for an explore around Doom.
Ben Wetsuited up ready for the trip, by RobE
We took the long walk to Cliffstile and as Jon was suffering from “neck arm” he declared that he was not going last as the hatch is heavy. This was an 80m descent with 2 re belays. Sounds simple right. Well, you would be correct, unless you are me. After Jon’s declaration of it being a fast rope was expecting a swift descent, however it was the complete opposite. I was using a simple and a braking krab as standard but I had to work hard to feed the rope through and was getting arm pump. I passed the first re belay with no issues. The second is a Y hang in the centre of the shaft. My first mistake was to clip one of my cowstails into the bolt rather than lower all the way to the Y hang itself. The second was not paying attention to the ropes as I clipped my simple on. I tested the simple, unclipped the cowstails, was ready to lower and then realised I had got the rope tangled with the re belay loop. Now, normal people would just clip their cowstails into the Y hang, redo the simple and go again. For some reason my brain thought I needed to get back up to the bolt and clip there so I faffed around do all sorts, standing in the rope loop. Using my hand jammer and foot loop. I was spending a lot of energy trying to get to this bolt. Conscious I had Joe above me at the first one waiting to come down and the 3 on the floor also waiting.
A moment of clarity made me realise what an idiot I was being and I knew what I needed to do, only, I couldn’t get the hand jammer off the rope despite trying to unweight it. I realised I could bridge in the shaft and eventually sorted my life out. I dropped to the floor of the shaft and made my apologises. “You got a bit of a sweat on there Ben” said Jon laughing. I couldn’t tell if it was sweat from embarrassment, the effort I had put in to sort things out, or the 5mm wetsuit I was wearing.
We slipped into chest deep water and followed a sough for around 15 minutes. This was a pretty little section with varying depths from shin deep to neck deep with beautiful brickwork archways. I was now very grateful for the wetsuit. Eventually we hit a ladder and climbed up to a step over to another ladder. “Don’t die” came a voice with a giggle as I was looking to step over to the other ladder. Good tip duly noted.
This took us into Glebe mine. Rob Jon and Joe have been here plenty, however, for Fabian and I, it was our first time. So there was a lot of (and for the whole trip) “WOW, this place is incredible” as we tried to keep up whilst also trying to look at everything.
At the end of this section we reached a chamber with some pools. On the right we passed a duck and followed the water to a climb back on ourselves and made our way crawling up some tubes. Rob and Jon pushed through a boulder choke to explore a draughting lead. I followed through the choke but had lost my sense of humour trying to manoeuvrer in tight spaces with an SRT kit and decided to make my way back to the other two who were playing around in another pool in a dead end. We followed the pool to the left which lead us to a dead end eventually. So we turned back, found a ladder and climbed on up and followed some passage.
Passing through one of the ducks, by RobE
Once again we reached a ladder, but this one I knew because at the base of this ladder you drop down into Doom. Here the world renowned Eavis Mine Tours began in earnest. We took a left and headed into a tight rift for Static Passage. This amazing passage gets better the further in you get. Jon, whilst not enthused by the start of the passage got excited as he slipped through the keyhole squeeze into a large walking rift that took us into a phreatic tube decorated in pristine stals.
Back to Doom and only a few steps further on “and on your left we have the unclimbed aven” we slid under a small gap to enter into a huge impressive dripping aven that went far higher than my fenix light could reach. This is still unclimbed and I could see on Rob's face how much he wants to get it done.
Back to the main passage again and as we ambled on Fabian asked where the waterfall was. Rob stated it was at Elastic Passage. “Oh cool, I love a waterfall” exclaimed Fabian. “not today you don’t” Rob retorted as we took a left turn just before Elastic Passage to head on deeper into Doom.
This section feels like stepping back into time. “Oh my god, look at all the hoof prints. Can you imagine what it was like for the donkeys” Gasped Fabian. After a moment of bemusement we all realised he was pointing out hob nail boot prints from t’owd man. Naturally we then mocked him about donkeys being sent down the shafts.
The hobnail boot prints were everywhere and led up a slope to a curved dry stone wall, this slope continues up to a windlass they had stone steps leading up to it and onwards. From here a manicured smooth slope winds upwards lined by dry stone walls. It feels like this area had a lot of care and attention given to it when being built. We poked left to look at a rotten stemple ladder and then pressed on to the T junction. Now my directions will get vague here because we went everywhere. We headed left at the junction which eventually lead to a dead end with a shaft that Rob had bolt climbed in the past. The impressive bit was looking up and seeing the stope rise up to darkness with stemples everywhere. On the way back to the junction we poked into other areas that were looser than a taco bell bowel movement which provided a bit of excitement to the trip.
Back at the T junction we headed over the wall and went to the Black Lagoon. This is as the name suggests, a dark black pool that we waded through with black stals and allsorts of yellows and oranges all over the far wall.
Once we had sufficiently poked in to most places we headed back to the entrance of Doom where we had stashed our SRT kits. Everyone opted to put their kit on, but having to crawl through Loper Lust I didn’t fancy it, so I chose to push my gear ahead of me. Loper lust in a wetsuit is a slip ‘N’ slide which is great on the flat and down, but to get out of Loper Lust it's mostly uphill. Once again I removed my helmet for the duck and dipped my head under to pass the low ceiling. Fabian however decided to dunk his face.
Fabian's mud facial, by RobE
So we are now in Inglorious Bastards of Cussey Pot. I wasn’t looking forward to prussicking in a wetsuit, however it wasn’t as bad as I thought. I adopted the strategy that I had used all trip in the dry areas, to unzip fully, much to the teams disgust.
This is my 3rd time in Cussey and I am starting to finesse the obstacles. It's a highly technical cave that can be insanely hard, or relatively easy depending upon whether you can find the subtle hand and foot holds. I climbed the second pitch with my chest jammer as back up. Its a lovely climb and far easier than prussicking due to the confines of the rift.
I removed my chest jammer for the vertical squeeze because that always becomes a pitch point and the gouges in the chest jammer make me wince. This did make the squeeze much easier. Although this time the tears were for the sounds of sharp rock scratching and catching on my wetsuit. The final feature that I find a challenge is the stemple climb in Coconut Airways. Today however my feet found the elusive footholds and it was almost easy, I popped up between the two stemples and knew that I was basically out now. Just a simple traverse over a drop and you are at the final pitch. Again much easier to free climb so I made my way out into the cold winter at midnight. Rob and Joe headed to secure Cliffstile's lid before we all piled into my van for warmth, snacks and the obligatory post session drink. Quite possibly the finest through trip I have ever done, Fabian agreed as he handed over an Eldon membership form.