Excalibur streamway extended!

With work in the Jenga Extensions paused, Pandemic Pot (downstream, of Jenga), and the River Dove dig both temporarily mothballed, and our project at Cawthorn still going nowhere fast, attention over the past few weeks has turned back to Excalibur Pot for a bit of fun.

It’s been so long since we did any work in the ‘old’ region of Excalibur, first explored in 2007, that several of our regular diggers haven’t even been down there, so are actively digging in the North York Moors without having actually seen the showpiece cave and streamway.

Last week a team headed down to the streamway for a nosey around, with recent talk of a revival of digging at Laura’s Demise (one of the few substantial passages heading into a blank area but choking completely with mud). Sparky and a few others headed upstream where, part way around the dry oxbow of Oxbow Hall, they spotted a draughting tube on the right (east) side of the passage at floor level, which they adopted as a new mini-project.

This week, we returned to Excalibur, with three Excalibur virgins, Chris Curry, Connor Stokes, and a North York Moors newbie/token Yank, Dylan Kocher, plus myself and Sparky. We headed down at 5:30pm on a pleasant afternoon. Sparky and Connor made fast progress to the main streamway, while I gave Dylan and Chris the full guided tour. Knowing Chris’ ability to squeeze through some impossibly small spaces, and noting Dylan’s similarly malnourished frame, I thought I would put them to some use as ferrets.

First, we climbed up into the high-level area above Parallel Passages. This is a complex but spacious area accessed by a slightly exposed 3m climb up (even more scary coming down). I had not been up there since we surveyed it in 2007-2008, but it was exactly as I remembered, a spacious balcony with a way through large boulders heading back over the direction we had come from. We navigated through the boulders, and I directed Chris and Dylan into various nooks and crannies. Nothing much more was found than what I remembered (other than it being a larger area than I thought), but several interesting tight inlets and rift/avens up here which Chris and Dylan gave their best shot at. This is almost back under Hutton Beck, so no doubt water finds its way directly in here at times.

With nothing found, we moved onto Balcony Passage, where I re-familiarised myself with the very close connection to the end of the Bedding Extensions, hoping to force Chris or Dylan in, but it was silted almost to the roof. I had forgotten there were dig buckets here, we must have had a go at this at some point in the past, but I don’t really remember when. We really should return to this project, it will make an exquisite round trip and might even yield some further continuation into the large blank space to the south/east of here.

Onwards down to the streamway, a tour downstream in extremely low water levels, and then upstream we met Sparky and Connor with a very loud bang and then the whole passage filling with fumes. Typical! Not wanting to get gassed, we carried on for what was meant to be a quick look at the upstream end. On arrival at the turn into Fossil Chamber, the water in the incoming passage was so low that we pushed upstream to the bitter end, where Dylan was more than happy to lie belly-down in the streamway pushing the continuation but it was definitely too tight. Totally grim! Nothing new there… except just a metre back, on the left (true right) of the passage is a small shelf with a barely body sized gnarly tube heading off into the gloom. It looked like it might just open out a little 4m further along, but there was no chance of me squeezing along. This must have been noted before, but perhaps when we surveyed we didn’t get quite this far upstream if the water levels were slightly higher, and besides, we almost certainly would have declared it to be too tight/grim.

I offered this one up to Dylan, who excitedly and without hesitation plunged in. He struggled along – I had made the correct decision to stay put – but then suddenly he seemed to be stood up at the end and scratting about at various things. Interesting! I moved over and let Chris follow, while waiting in a bent-double position knee-deep in the streamway.

After a few minutes, their boots disappeared from my sight, and I could no longer hear them over the sound of the water. They’d gone!

They did not return – not after a few minutes – and not after ten minutes. Well, they’ve either found something good, or they’re both dead. I headed back to Fossil Chamber to see if I could hear them from there – no – and so I headed back to rejoin Sparky and Connor for a while as I was starting to get pretty cold.

Sparky’s dig was a tube at floor level just beyond Wilsdon Way, in the dry oxbow that gives Oxbow Hall its name. They had already engineered this to 4-5m long, turning initially right, then left, then in the distance right again (returning east I guess), and heading into a blank area on the survey just to the west of Hutton Beck. The draught was really good, and it felt encouraging, but lots of work needed here.

Still no sign of Chris and Dylan. Crap, surely they’re dead! Who’s gonna fit through to get them out? We headed upstream and to where they had left me, still nothing, but a few minutes later came the relieving flicker of lights as they returned. Well, if they’re not dead, that can only mean a decent discovery. Sure enough, Chris returned, proclaiming that we now had more cave to survey.

Sparky videoed as Chris and Dylan recounted their adventure, having pushed about 30-50m further on (north?) from where they left me, through several extremely arduous squeezes, to return to the streamway which they followed to a fork, with two hands and knees size crawling inlet passages heading off into the distance. Being true gents (and realising I was probably freezing by now) they returned and left these two open passages for a future trip.

So, only 18 years after we first reached the surveyed upper limit of the Excalibur streamway, it is now at least 30-50m longer, and with two open crawling height inlets going off into the distance to be explored. This is presumably going under the field, in the direction of the top sinks, and must be getting close.

It just goes to show what a revisit to old haunts with fresh eyes (and two incredibly skinny, double-hard, young and sickeningly enthusiastic cavers) can achieve.

Well done Dylan and Chris.

Dylan, in tribute to you I name these extensions MEGA (Make Excalibur Great Again). For Chris, somewhere up there is a ‘Curry Inlet’ waiting to be named, which will make Notts II very jealous.