Dent de Crolles – Easter 2006
Four of the
youngest members of the BEC, including two of the most recently joined members
went to the Dent de Crolles for the long Easter weekend and completed the Trou
Glaz to Guiers Mort traverse. (
Rich Bayfield, Rich Beer and Charlotte Harris)
Having recently
become a full tax paying member of society (i.e. not a student) I have had to
face the realities of 22 days leave a year! Due to this the idea of doing long
weekend pull-through trips in some of the classic European caves appealed.
I knew Easter would
be a bit early for high Alpine caving because of the snow. However some people
recommended the Dent de Crolle as the Trou Glaz is a big yogi bear entrance
near the path and wont be snow plugged I did a bit of my own research and was
led to believe that the snow would probably have gone so we booked our flights
and crossed our fingers.
Due to the time of
year none of the usual campsites were open but I managed to find a site a bit
further away which also had Chalets. The Balcon Chartreuse is in Mirabel les
Eschelles, about 40min drive away from the caving area.
We flew in to
shopping for our stay on route to the campsite. By 1.30pm we were sat on the
veranda of our chalet enjoying a proper French lunch in the beautiful sun
shine. The accommodation was perfect for us, basically a large garden shed with
a small upper floor for three mattresses, a small bathroom with shower and
another separate bedroom. The rest of the space was for living, cooking and
eating, with a dining table and all the cooking facilities we needed.
We had decided
early on that we wanted indoor self catering accommodation. It saves weight on
the plane as you dont need tents, sleeping bags, stoves, pans etc. Also at
this time of year when the weather is unpredictable coming back to a nice warm
dry hut is great and finally when doing a long weekend like this it is very
easy to keep unsociable hours i.e back too late to go to the restaurant. So
coming back to a tent at midnight in the rain to start cooking didnt appeal.
The Chalet was also
pretty cheap, costing only 60E a night for everyone so roughly £10 a head per
night. Plus when you have somewhere decent to eat and drink there is less
temptation to head for the nearest restaurant/bar so saving more money
overall.
On Friday afternoon
we packed up our kit and headed for St. Pierre de Chartreuse, the village
closest to the bottom entrance of Guiers Mort. We parked in a car park at the
end of the road by the foot of the mountain and got changed in the sunshine.
Although there was a lot of snow on the path the sun was hot and we all worked
up a sweat on the walk. After one wrong turn we realised we had to follow the
track with the large yellow cross and were soon climbing towards the entrance.
(Park in the car
park, follow path until big corner/clearing) where bridge crosses river and
where waterfall comes over cliff far above (you will know when you are here).
Continue on the main path past here until you see a right hand turn which
climbs steeply. Very obvious path and clear junction with a yellow X on a tree
stump. Follow this until you reach a small stone building out of which a stream
emerges. Stepping over the stream the path becomes a tiny track zig zagging up
the hill. After a short distance it rejoins another larger path and 50m ahead
is a sign post for the source of Guiers Mort, with a path which goes off to the
left. Follow this zig zagging path up to the entrance.)
The entrance is a
massive resurgence with traverse lines coming out on both sides to reach the
cliff. There was plenty of snow about but none of it prevented us getting to
the cave and we were soon heading off down the entrance passage.
The stream emerges
mostly from a hole on the right but the way on is down the larger dryer tunnel
which soon reaches a large chamber with the obvious way on the right. However
at the back of the chamber a small draughting hole can be entered which takes
you towards the bottom of Puits Pierre. Follow the small passage ahead,
traversing over a pit and then afterwards climbing up to the left. If in doubt
follow the warn, obvious draughting way. When the crawl emerges turn left and
then take the next left to find the bottom of Puits Pierre.
Fortunately for us
the pitch was rigged and judging by the quality of rope and the fact there are
several re-belays it probably always is. Up the rope the passage is large at
first then turns into an uphill, slippery crawl at the end of which the way on
is right (left is marked with a line of stones).
Then we followed
the large obvious passages, over the impressive pitch
until eventually reaching the bottom of Puits Banane. Banane was also rigged
and similarly to
I suspect it normally is. The navigation through this section is fairly easy
once youve done it once but there are many passages to confuse and tempt you
and we were happy to have a survey from Mad Phil and descriptions from the
internet both of which Id laminated beforehand.
Banane leads to a
high level passage, interrupted half way by a short traverse. Not long after
this we reached the head of the cascade Rocheuse where we checked the pitch was
rigged. Happy to see the rope the others opened our snack supply whilst I
dropped part way down the pitch to check it looked ok. Satisfied with the pitch
we turned around and headed out with the knowledge that everything was in place
for the through trip. Most of all we were surprised at how quickly wed reached
this point in the cave. Wed crossed two and a half of the four survey sheets
and it only took about and hour and a half to get out from this point.
We were back at the
hut at about 11.45 for a quick dinner and then straight into bed for a good
nights sleep before the big trip.
When we woke up on
Saturday the rain was pouring down. We knew this wouldnt affect the trip
which is pretty much dry the whole way but it would make the hike up to Trou
Glaz miserable. Hopeful that that weather would be better closer to the caves
we set off anyway and fortunately by the time we reached the car park the rain
had stopped.
There are several
routes to the Trou Glaz entrance. The shortest route is to drive to the Col du
Coq. However as didnt have a second car, our only option was to park by the
bottom entrance and walk up. Apparently there is a short but scary route from
the Guiers Mort entrance across and up the cliffs. The descriptions we read
were of people doing this in the summer so given the weather conditions and the
snow at this height we opted for the long way round. This means walking first
to the
des Ayes (about an hour and a half walk to the area just above the Col du Coq)
then across the slopes to the entrance. This was all on a proper, heavily
marked foot path so we were confident of having no problems despite expecting
to be traipsing through snow most of the way.
The lower part of
the path was fairly steep and over snow it was hard work. However the path was
large and well protected and we were happy to trudge upwards. When we reached
the
Ayes though things took a different turn. The path turned into a narrow and
exposed ledge which is probably quite fun in the summer. However with snow
covering the mountain side this became pretty treacherous. It soon got even
worse as the path completely disappeared under the snow and we had to cut steps
across 45 degree snow slopes with nothing but a long drop below. It took us
over two hours and forty minutes instead of about forty minutes to cover the
distance to the Trou Glaz entrance and we were all relieved to reach the cave.
Standing in the entrance we all knew the hardest bit of the day was finished
just a quick caving trip to do now.
The entrance splits
in two after about a hundred meters. We went to the left and followed the
passage until we found a 45 degree bedding plane which led to a squeeze up into
a chamber. Ducking under the left hand wall the passage rose and we walked
about twenty metres until up on the right we spotted the ledge leading to the
lantern pitches. This is easy to miss as there are plenty of signs pointing
straight on and it looks like the obvious route. Straight ahead is actually a
long bypass to the lantern pitches so perhaps gets just as much traffic as
them.
The pitches were
covered in ice which gave me a little concern. Namely that we would find an
iced up squeeze! We dropped down the first two pitches quickly and at the
bottom of the second I wandered off to find the next pitch head. The entire
belay was covered with ice but fortunately there was another anchor on the left
hand wall. I knew that at the bottom of this pitch we would find the pitch
bypass passage back up to the entrance so as long as we could get down and
reach the passage it would be ok. To be safe I told the others to keep the top
two pitches rigged whilst I dropped the third and checked for a way through.
Fortunately there were no iced up squeezes and we pulled down and headed for
the fourth lantern pitch, five minutes ahead.
The fourth pitch is
an impressive drop in the floor of a train tunnel sized passage for some
reason the passage has just decided to continue 12m lower down in exactly the
same vein.
Shortly after this
we traversed half way over a pit and climbed round to the right to find the big
36m pitch. This sounded wet but all the water was out of the way at the bottom
and we dropped down easily. From here there are two short pitches to reach the
meandering stream way and another slightly longer one before the puits de
lArche where you abseil all of about 4m to a traverse line leading straight
over. This takes you immediately to the head of the 11m puits des Maichanceux,
followed by another of the same (P. du Biouvac). Marching up the passage here
you soon enter Les Champs Elysees, which leads to the galerie des Champignons.
Full of pop corn type formations (or mushroom like as the name suggests) this
is where the end of the Rocheuse rope is found. Like Puits Pierre and Banane it
appears this is always rigged at least it is not possible to rig it as a pull
through! To find the bottom of the rope climb straight up where the warn
section is and a muddy rope can be found against the rock.
Once at the top of
Rocheuse it was just a matter of repeating our exit of the previous day. The
only difference was the amount of water now emerging from the cave due to the
rain and snow melt.
We were back at car
at 11.40 and soon in the chalet stuffing our faces and drinking beer, feeling
suitably happy with ourselves.
To see more photos
of the above trip please take a look at photos taken by both Richs
http://www.flickr.com/photos/rbeer/sets/72057594109895832/
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