Aven de Rocas

Photo of Aven de Rocas on the front cover of
the 2015 CLPA inventaire

In 2012, the CLPA discovered several holes in a rough field, very close to Jean’s house in Le Besses.
For a few years I had joked that he had a cave in his garden.
The digging efforts of ‘Academie de Rocas’ had discovered several pitches, some with waterfalls and two of impressive dimensions. 
The front cover of the most recent journal of the CLPA was adorned with the biggest pitch.
Phillipe Vernant kindly offered to take us down Rocas and show us around. As part of the digging team, he knew the place extremely well.
Rick Van Dijk was up for his 3rd SRT trip here and Ashley and Rich stayed on the surface to sort out the radio location equipment, trying to get an accurate fix on a known chamber with a known survey.
Graham Naylor had built us a Nicola 3 prototype and two aerials to try to radio locate the large chamber a the end of the big sump in Coudouliere.
Now that the trip was off, we went to get a bit more practice and get a few more people trained in its use.
The entrance was a typical, muddy dig, with red slime everywhere. The ropes were bit quick too, covered in a layer of thick mud.
Still with a wobbly ankle and a newly damaged shoulder (from getting the boulder choke wrong in Coudouliere), I took my time. Some easy meandres later and the impressive pitches were met. 

Christine in the entrance

At the bottom of the final major pitch, we unpacked the radio location aerial and switched it on. The surface team began laying spools of line among bushes and, despite a fluctuating signal, thought they had got a fix.
Phillipe and I sat around for an hour putting the caving world to rights, while Rick sat in a higher chamber sorting out his camera for the return trip.
It was somewhat unfortunate that he had left his ‘pains au chocolate’ in our daren drum!
Once the hour was up, we switched it off, packed it up and made our way steadily out of the cave. 
My right shoulder was becoming fairly useless at this stage and I took quite a while to get off pitch heads, but this seemed to please Rick who was happily snapping away with his camera and achieving nice results. 

Once back in daylight, the surface team looked a bit sheepish.
They thought they had got a fix, but the numbers and signal had been fluctuating wildly and they couldn’t work out why.
This rang a bell.
I looked up and to my horror, the cave entrance was completely surrounded by overhead powerlines.
In fact, three of them created a perfect triangle and the cave was right in the middle of it!
Graham had warned us that overhead lines would cause big fluctuations in the signal and he wasn’t wrong!

Chris at one of the pitch heads. Photo: Rick Van Dijk

It would not have been an issue over Coudouliere – but here, the village was infested with them…
In any case, the fix point was GPS tagged and the co-ordinates given to Phillipe. He took them home and put an overlay if the cave survey onto Google Earth and …voila!
The fix was smack bang on top of the chamber we had been in.

This seemed far too good to be true…so we made plans to visit another cave – L’Esquirol – where I had never been before, to try again and make sure it was not a fluke. 
We retired to the café in St Maurice de Navacelles which is always a welcome refuge after caving and diving trips. 

Chris ascending

Main pitch in Aven de Rocas

Not our cat!

We appear to have a visitor.

Not our Cat has been sniffing around for the last few nights and today, he decided to make himself at home.
Luckily Rich and I are cat lovers but we are too busy and away too much to get our own.
So we adopted him!

Checking out the spare room

Checking out the spare bed

Quite happy on the spare bed...

Butter wouldn't melt

Found a perfect spot behind the explo box...

Chilling on the patio

Now he considers this his home...

Spoilt by Rich

Sweaty moggy

Sweaty cat

No boundaries...

Is my bacon ready?

I thought he might want a blanket. He did.

Rodel

Rick Van Dijk in Rodel dry passages

There seems to be a bit of a fad about sidemount at the moment. I'm not sure why, as most 'gurus' have rarely dived caves such as the Rodel, where sidemount is absolutely necessary.
It is not just necessary for the awkward carry (walk up a riverbed for 100 metres or so and then crawl on your belly for another 70 metres or so and then crawl/stoop the rest of the way) but underwater too. 
It is actually one of the easiest to access sites in the Herault, but if you don't like Trou Madame at low water, forget this one.
I love the place.
It is easiest to chain gear to make rapid progress to the sump and knee pads are essential.
The visibility is normally very good but a second thunder storm ruined it for this trip.
It was a milky 4 metres or so, but a good experience for Ash and Rick who hadn't dived it before.

Rich in Rodel

I took the opportunity to try some photos and more video but 
the visibility was nowhere near as good as 2012. 
But it was fun in any case...

Rick Van Dijk in Rodel cobble squeeze (advisable to dig it open first and keep away from the line which goes through the smallest part...)

Marker close to the end of the line

Abime de Mas Raynal

Christine descending Mas Raynal
Super Direct in 2002

It occurred to me that I hadn't been to this wonderful cave since about 2003. 
I was very much looking forward to rigging it this time, rather than being pushed back behind 'some bloke' who always assumed that it was a man's job. 
Bollocks to that, I say. 
In 2002, on only my 3rd SRT trip, I went 'over the edge' and did the main hang or 'super direct' route which is 106 clean metres straight off a rusty iron bar in broad daylight on a single rope.
The only interruption is a re-belay some 30m from the crashing river below. The water heads North West to Source du Sorgues and is typically blue and cold.

Rick Van Dijk on his 2nd SRT trip...

The multi-pitch route is friendlier and has some snaggy, slimy green slopes on route to the final hang.
It is partially P-hung and partially requires spits and hangers - so it's advisable to take some hangers.
Ashley, my CDG trainee, wanted to do the main hang on 8mm. He rigged it but only ascended it and used our ropes on the way down.
The cave is like Alum Pot on speed. I think it is a little bigger in dimensions but the main hang is about the same.

Sunlight pours down the main shaft and the chilly gloom of the massive side inlet makes for some great silhouette photos. 

Rich at the bottom of Mas Raynal

I'm very proud of Rich who, from a climbing background, is not a fan of hanging over big holes on a single rope, never mind in daylight. He managed to de-rig most of it mostly without complaint.

Me rigging

The view from the bottom

Ash on his way up the main hang

Ash ascending

Rich and Rick on the multi pitch route while Ash ascends in the background

Source du Sorgues....

Sorgues

With the weather ruining most of the local sites, we headed up to Aveyron to dive a cave which is usually in very good condition.


The Sorgues is the resurgence for the Mas Raynal cave some 4km away.
It usually has inviting, blue water and today was no exception.
Actually, it was a little milkier than normal...but Rick, Rich, Ash and myself had a pleasant dive nonetheless. Such a shame this cave is so short at only 200 or so metres long.
On our way home, we stuck our heads into the Rodel to inspect the water for a future dive. It looked pretty undamaged by the recent flooding and we kept it in our pocket for another day.

Butterfly at Sorgues

Another day, another dive... Christine in the Sorgues, by Richard Walker

Rick van Dijk in Rodel dry passages. It is necessary to carry diving gear through here to dive the stunning, sidemount sump.

Not the Avencas...

The storm in Montpellier last Sunday not only killed several people, but really messed up the sumps in the region.

Montpellier Floods

We learned from Jean Tarrit, our good friend from CLPA and also the lady at the campsite that only 15mm was forecast.
In fact, about 1.6 metres fell and the result was a shock for this time of year and devastating for the people in Montpellier.
It was sobering to realise that the meteo office could get it so wrong - and had we arrived several days earlier, I have no doubt there would have been a fatality.

In the morning, we were greeted by GERSAM, a local caving club and also Jean Tarrit and we had lots of coffee and conversation. We cursed the weather, but also made plans for the times ahead. 
We were very pleased to meet Pierre from GERSAM who had been sorting out access with the local mayor and the group were excited to see the radio-location equipment.

Man go caving...fill can with cat litter...

We made an attempt today to go and visit Grotte Avencas, but as it was so close to the Bueges valley, I was not hopeful that it would be diveable.
Ashley got in first and declared it 'Fucked'. 
We took our gear back to the campsite and got in the swimming pool. We wondered if that was the closest we would get to diving....

Dutch neighbours...

The French Meteo...

Vallee de la Vis

Rich and I drove the last few hours to camping le Val d'Herault and the Dutch gang had already headed over to Coudouliere to check out the entrance and see if scooters would fit.

Vis Gorge

Rich and I drove down the stunning Vis gorge. We hung our heads out of the windows, trying to see if the river was looking the right colour. 
It did not look right to me.

We crossed the bridge at St Bauzille de Putois and there was definitely too much water of the wrong colour.

As we drove to the campsite, everything looked green and there had clearly been plenty of rain - but it had not been forecast.
We did a quick supermarket shop and headed over to Coudouliere to find the guys had brought all their gear to the entrance - but on looking at the sump, this trip was clearly not going ahead.

Meanwhile, Rich and I paid a quick visit to the source de Bueges and it was high and a vile colour. We were in no doubt that the Coudouliere exped was over for 2015.

Pedro pretty much sums it up...

At Coudouliere, we found Pedro Balordi blowing up the boulder choke to get the suex cowlings through. They figured this needed doing in any case for a return trip.

The gear made it's way back to the cars and we headed into the camp site to re-adjust, unpack the exped gear and touch base with the French cavers to make plans for the next few weeks.

Anton gets hold of Pedro's pink nail polish...what else is a boy to do?