I was keen to get more knowledge of this vast system on Easegill so we wasted no time and took the familiar route over towards Easegill and at over 100km of passage, makes this the site of one of the largest if not THE largest cave system in Europe.
We kitted up outside Bullpot farm and made the trek over the fell then started looking along the east wall of Easegill we soon located the walled off entrance to Mistral and climbed down the entrance shaft then started the crawl along the dug out fissure. The passage has a few ninety degree bends and then after a few minuets we climbed over a few rocks and into a chamber where we could stand up. There were passages that went immediately to the left and one that headed over to the right, the right hand passage heads towards the Crumbles entrance series. We wanted to go to the left passage and get further into the system . This left hand passage is a hands and knees crawl for a short distance and soon opens up into a nice chamber named The Hobbit. There were seemingly numerous passages to take but as ever Bob knew the way and we had another tunnel to crawl along. After a while the tunnel opened out into a nice chamber known as dusty junction. This was identifiable by some piles of stones arranged in the middle of the floor this is also the junction that has the connection to Link pot. Bob led the way along some large tunnels that tuned into big impressive and very muddy chambers the first one was named The Hall Of Ten we had a quick look around the boulders on the floor to the Pippikin stream way but more of this later. We made our way on through into another big chamber with a thick gooey mud floor and some very interesting and anatomically peculiar man made mud sculptures, don't ask! Now our next destination was to Gour Hall so after negotiating the thickest mud floor I have ever had to tread to the top end of the chamber a tunnel heading off to the right was revealed. This passage was a mixture of hand and knees crawling with some flat out sections and a couple of minor squeezes however the passage soon gets bigger and opens up into a fine chamber with some impressive stalagmite bosses that have been taped off .We followed the chamber towards the left and then following a nicely decorated passage soon opened up into a beautifully decorated chamber called Gour Hall. We took in the sights and admired the stunning gour pools at the bottom of the chamber the static pools were filled right to the edges and looked like horizon swimming pools with the reflections of the stalactites mirrored in the surface of the water. I wish I could show you a picture but this was probably the only trip I didn't have my camera! To say I was gutted is understating it, still its another excuse to go back someday! After Dan and Fay had a look at one of the many on going digging projects we made our way back to the Hall of Ten and started wriggling through the boulders in the floor to the Pippikin stream way . Going through the boulders required a little contortion but you soon reached a small chamber with a stream flowing along the floor. We made our way upstream for a few meters and had to climb upwards and crawl along the top of the narrow fissure with your legs and arms straddling the stream twenty feet below. I didn't like this bit as I was covered in mud and struggling for grip and I had visions of sliding down into the rift below flashing through my head, this was partly bought about by Jack Pickup in Bernie's telling us about a recent rescue in Pippikin where a girl exhausted slid into a rift and got jammed in there! She did however get herself out by the time the rescue team got there. This passage seemed exactly as Jack described but we soon reached a right hand passage that lead into another the top of another rift with a bigger stream flowing, the noise of crashing water getting louder. The rift had a rectangular rock forming a small bridge half way down the rift,Bob being a proficient climber had no problem getting down I was a little more tentative , I got a foot on the bridge and tried to chimney the rest of the way down but just ended up holding onto the bridge and letting go. It was not as bad as it first looked when I originally stared over the edge! Dan and Emma made their way down using a little improvised acrobatics. We followed the passage downstream and went past the roaring water from the Cigalere inlet passage then after following the passage further we arrived at some boulders stacked with an obvious exit in the roof. We climbed back out of the boulders and arrived back into the big muddy chamber at the far side of the Hall of Ten. We started to make our way back and Dan and Emma decided to test there route finding skills and between us we managed to get back to the recognisable Dusty Junction and we then negotiated the crawls and passages then we got to the chamber called The Hobbit and from there we could feel the fresh air that you sense when you get close to the entrance. Another short crawl and we came to the small chamber at the end of the entrance crawls .Emma suggested we go right and I agreed, this section is a bit narrow in places but I could feel the cool fresh air blowing past me and we just carried on for a little further then we emerged into the entrance shaft and day light. This was my first time down this part of the vast three counties system and it is a fine section of the system with some great passages ,big chambers and fine formations. I still feel I don't know my way around it, but it is something I will just have to learn section by section. Overall this is a great cave is a definite one to do again.
