OFD2/Cwm Dwr - Alastair Gott
Managed to haul my ass down to south wales this weekend to meet up with two people I will be joining on the Tresviso Expedition to Spain- Toby Dryden and Phil Walker. It started on Friday night with a pint in the Ancient Briton in Pen-y-cae followed by some cider back at the hut before a respectable 1am turn in to bed.
A leisurely start with 4? cups of tea and coffee and a pint of water. Me, Phil and an outdoor instructor from Mid wales called Alan Braybrooke were ready to sample the delights of Ogof Ffynnon Du, starting at the Top entrance (OFD2). Specifically delighting over the challenges of the Chasm, the TRAVERSES and the scaff bar which you have to shuffle your feet across over a 8+m drop (safety first!- rule 1 Don't look down).
We encountered only a few hitches with route nav, Phil and Alan having been to "three" before but having made some wrong turns the last time, we managed to avoid Timo's table on the way in, by taking an alternative route.
Once past all the challenges of route nav, climbs and traverses, you encounter the streamway, the dark black rock of the OFD streamway has it's own character, but is an absolute delight to navigate up to Smiths armoury. Smiths Armoury is the current end to the upstream OFD system, so quite possibly marks the place in OFD where you are furthest from any entrance. It is formed of a roof collapse in the bedding, there is almost certainly more in that system, but the only way you will find out is to pick a spot in the floor which is quite near to a wall and dig!
Our trip to the end and back took approx. 6-6.5 hours. So a respectable time.
After a curry down the valley and a Debauched evening over at the Stump with various BEC and Wealden members till 3am, it was ever going to be a leisurely start, firstly by tucking myself away in the safety of the starless river shop, with the never disapproving Tony Seddon.
I managed to hide here for a while before Phil found me to first recall some of last nights antics, but also to whip me into sorting the 400m of rope and bolts which we procured from Mark Wright a couple of weeks ago. freeing up valuable space in my flat.
No body seemed to be going caving, but I found out that Ellen Cooper was hankering after going to Cwm Dwr, it must have been about 6 years since I was last in here, Kevin Francis will be able to tell me I'm sure. I believe it could have been on a trip with him and Vicky (I could be wrong!), so in fact it could be less time.
I was playing third wheel to Ellen and Josh Bratchley, but neither of them minded me on the trip. So with the excellent guidance of Josh we were in and out in about 3 hours, quickly finding ourselves at the Confluence, where a few photo's ensued... and then back up the route with the Belly flop and the sandy passages.
Josh knew Cwm Dwr like the back of his hand, the boulder choke (no problem!), the route down in the floor of the smithy (found!) and the route turning right(?) at the top of Big Shacks (Bossed!).
An excellent weekend.
Alastair Gott at The Confluence, Cwm Dwr. Photo Copyright © Josh Bratchley.