|
 |
1996 Yangtze Gorges Expedition
First Days
Jiang Kou Area
On the plateau above Furong Dong the team split up, to look at different sites of interest.
|
|
Xin Lu Kou had been explored to a depth of 215m by the 1994 expedition. I had high hopes it would soon drop into Furong Dong via a squeeze at the bottom of the 143m pitch. After three days spent rigging the cave, battling through the squeeze, and roping down three 15m pitches in a series of cramped passages, we found ourselves in an awkward mud filled crawl. Eventually even I saw this was probably not the best way into the huge passages predicted beyond Furong Dong show cave.
|
|
|
|
Steve Mulhull surveys the shredded remains of his oversuit. His first caving trip in China had contained passages somewhat different from the huge passages he'd been promised.
|
|
Ali washes feet
|
Ali Garman summed it up -
'The intrepid Brian Judd, never a man to give up easily, or even when it makes sense, had found a mud filled flat out crawl leading off from the squalid mud filled chamber. Somehow in a country filled with some of the worlds grandest caves he persuaded his two accomplices to follow him down a sort of squalid sewer.' |
|
|
|
Team near entrance to Tau Wan Dong
|
Tuo Wan Dong was far from small and consisted of a shaft some 80m long and 50m wide. Ben Lovett, Kevin Munn and Pete Francis took two days to cut through dense vegetation, rig an 85m pitch and survey the bottom. A small stream sinks in mud, but there is no way on. |
Not the most venomous snake
Photo: Pete Francis
|
Pete saw a two metre long snake in Tuo Wan Dong. That evening Zhang Ren warned us that the locals had told him there were many dangerous snakes in the area. One particularly venomous snake frequented cave entrances in the hot weather. We would know it because it was black with white spots, quite short and fat in the middle. There were also little green venomous bamboo snakes and ... |
|
|
|
There was a short silence after Zhang had finished speaking. Then a little voice piped up from the back, enquiring what we should do if bitten and whether the local hospital held any antivenoms. Zhang Ren replied, "Ah yes...If you do get bitten...sit down... and wait five minutes... to die!" Coming from countries where more people die from a bee sting than snake bite, we weren't quite sure if he was serious. We did note that the older local people always prodded wild vegetation with a long stick before venturing into it. |
