Spiral Staircase

After a recent surveying trip with Hugh and Ray Duffy the possibilities of a connection between Spiral Staircase and Wretched Rabbit were highlighted. On Wednesday 24th August Ruth, Duncan Jones and myself began digging in Wretched Rabbit in a likely looking alcove just below the thigh high inlet about 20m beyond the Great Rift. We hit bedrock and decided to abandon this and explored the upper passeges of Wretched Rabbit. The following Wednesday Ruth, Brian Ward and myself attacked the … Read More

Sorry Simon , But when Steve Pickles & I were digging the Hole in the Roof of S.S. ,Steve slid down the Big Rift so fast , he broke a shin bone upon landing . Brave lad limped all the way back to Bull Pot. I agree though , I think you’re on a winner there. Cheers Jim Newton.

We were ready for the Easegill clean up but this seemed unlikely to happen so Ruth and I decided to visit Spiral Staircase and the dig Upstairs and Downstairs once again. At Inglesport we met a very tired Paul Windle who had been involved in an incident at Hammer Pot, but with the promise of just a bit of boulder proddling he agreed to come with us. Armed with a couple of proddling sticks and the boulder meister himself (Paul) … Read More

Wednesday 7th September The team was six strong, Ray, Sam, Dave, Brian, Ruth and myself. We decided to split into two teams, Brian, Dave and Ruth to head off to Spiral Staircase and continue proddling those boulders downstairs and Ray, Sam and me to vacuum upstairs. We left the farm carrying an assortment of wood and scaffolding to shore the crater. When we reached Wretched Rabbit we began lowering the wood down the rope climbs and Ray scurried off to … Read More

Tuesday 13th September Return of the Keystone Cobblers (Sam L. ,Andy Whitney & the venerable Mr Duffy) to continue the good work. Achieved several of Simon’s objectives: > 2. Clear the left hand wall (looking downstream) to bedrock Done. The inlet on this side had a nice gully which has been neatly walled up. There’s a nice limestone spur to stand on as you walk across, this continues down in to the floor and shelters the hole to Downstairs nicely. … Read More

Upstairs and Downstairs the real breakthrough September 21st Richard Bilton Simon Jobling We met at farm with the intention of popping down to Spiral Staircase and clearing the rubble from downstairs, which some inconsiderate builders had left. Armed with yet another scaffolding pole we got to upstairs and photographed the results of the frantic digging and decided to leave a torch pointing down the hole. We then began the journey to Downstairs and took photos of the rubble filled passage … Read More

The Holey Land, 05/10/05 Sam, Ray & Andy W. Well true to form, last weeks efforts were washed away behind the shoring, however this appears to be just consolidation of the pile and cleaning out of the mud. So there was not too much to clear out from the bottom. Hampered by the fact that our freshly refurbished clamps had been stolen by THE SWIVEL CLAMP THIEF (Da-Dun Daaaaaaa, drum roll and all that, I wonder where they could have … Read More

Bill and Simon J Yet another quick trip to see state of play in the hole. Scaffolding looks stable and the hole was again filled in with largish cobbles, but no mud. Tried to empty from top but no hope so Simon shot off down Wretched Rabbit to have a go from Downstairs whilst Bill played Upstairs. Once Downstairs Simon cleared the rubble to allow enough room to get beneath the hole face up, and after squeezing, thrutching and inching … Read More

Right, first of all WHO???? wrote the article that ended up in Descent? All very nice thank you very much but Simon and I are a bit baffled, since being the two people to whom it is attributed, we were duped for a while into thinking the other one had written it when in fact neither of us had done so. Mmmmm? Anyway, Sat 17th Dec 05 saw Simon and I starting the slow and dodgy process of undermining the … Read More

6th and 13th January Ray Duffy and Sam Lieberman Two more trips sorting out the boulder pile, another layer of scaffolding removed, all the gravity defying cobbles have settled now, next trip will probably see all of the scaffolding removed. It’s now at the stage that we could do with some help either shifting cobbles to the building face or removing wood and scaff bars back to the surface. Next Thursday anyone? Sam.