Report: Club trip to Little  Neath River Cave, S. Wales.
 
Saturday 24th July 04
Cavers: Richard Taylor, Ken Passant, Andy  Sparrow, Glynn Rowland, Danielle Gorman, Melanie Lloyd, Claire Lloyd, Andrew  Pollard, Chris Binding.
 
We met from 8:00am at the Lillypool Cafe in  Shipham for breakfast and then headed on in a two car convoy to meet up with Andy  & Mel who were already in South Wales; after an uneventful journey, only  stopping off at the Neath loos for a quick piddle, we arrived at the twentyfirst  century farm which is the Little Neath River Cave carpark and paid our one pound per  person to the smiling farmer's wife. A pleasant change in the sunny outside and  short walk to the cave entrance whereupon we met some campers who kindly took  a group photo of us (below).
 

L to R: Rich, Claire, Andy S,  Danielle, Glynn, Mel, Andy P, Chris, Ken.

 
Going first through the entrance gave an  opportunity to clear away all the spiders and cobwebs, of which there were many; a  faint odor of death was apparent too but this is quite normal apparently since  creatures get washed in and perish during floods. Otherwise it was all very nice  with good warm water accompanying the wriggle in the 100 foot long entrance  sequence followed by the duck before opening into larger stream passage.  Got a photo of the duck being done by Ken (below).
 

Ken on the downstream side of the  duck, helmet off and crouching!

Once we had regrouped we trudged off  downstream, did the little waterfall and found our way through the boulder pile before  climbing up into the canal bypass route, admiring the fine gour slope and  beginning the somewhat arduous crawl. The passage opens out after a short awkward  thrutchy scramble into a finely decorated dry passage whereupon some photos of  the girls doing the three monkeys were taken.
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Mel, Claire and  Danielle.

Richard led the group towards the main stream  and we made our way through the water and large passage towards Bouncing  Boulder Hall. On the way we stopped off to build a nice sandcastle with a moat on the riverbank! Everyone was enjoying the walk judging by the whoops and  laughter although making progress was tiresome, especially at the stooping  sections. Ken managed to get ahead of the group beyond the duck and hid up in the roof  tube which allowed him to leer out to the unsuspecting cavers following on  behind and make them jump with fright! If you've seen Ken you'll know what it's like.
The fun and games continued and a water fight  broke out when Ken removed his hole-filled gloves and they became used as  a water pistol!

 

Claire, Danielle and Ken have a  water fight while laughing their heads off.

 

We continued downstream around more low  stooping corners until the passage opened up with the nice water slide leading  into slightly deeper water where it was possible to have a nice swim and  relax. The hardened cavers continued to the increasingly lower crawl until sump 2  was reached; it was now time to continue the trip upstream and find the  canal - a 150m wet crawl.
 
The return up through Bouncing Boulder Hall  was a case of more of the same until we reached the canal whereupon everyone  started crawling and paddling their way upstream in the gorgeous warm water. Ken  took some time off to thrash about with his legs to make plumes of water  blocking the path of those behind and a lot of general fun and games were to be had.
 
It was over far too soon and we stood up to  find ourselves in sand chamber and had a look at the pretties on the ledge  before splitting into two groups; some went to have a look at Sump 1 while the  others headed off upstream to find the way out. We regrouped near the little  waterfall and made our way out.

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Danielle crawls out into daylight.       

 Richard has a rest in the stream while Claire and Danielle exchange knitting  tips & gossip.

 
To cool off and wash away some of the maggots  which were floating in the entrance stream (something had definitely died in  there!) many took the chance to lie down in the stream; only to find shortly  afterwards that they'd got covered in small leeches which had been disturbed by the  tired cavers!
 
So, apart from the leeches, maggots, spiders,  cobwebs and dead things, it was a darn fine trip with plenty of fun for everyone  and a good club trip all round!
 
The time underground was three and a half  hours in total.