Homecoming - Beyond Watershed in Homecoming Flowstone Canyon

Sat 08 Jul 2023
Sarah Parker



I carried my caving and bivvy gear from Top Camp to Homecoming whilst Harry and Charlotte carried Top Camp's second shovel and a camp bed (surprisingliy heavy) to be picked up by the Garlic Cave people.

After a bit of faff at the surface we got underground and to the bottom of Wallace and Grommit without any problems. We headed up to the little pitch to Propane Nightmares, down a series of little pitches, past the "deathy" sump, reaching the top of the "Strained by Gravity" pitch. We layered up and Harry set off to finish rigging it. Charlotte and I came down. I didn't enjoy the second deviation (it was quite rubby) although apparently I went round the wrong side of a boulder. I think a rebelay should be added here for people (like myself) who don't look down too much when abseiling.

The pitch drops into a drippy, bouldery chamber. We found our way through into a rift with surprisingly nice stal and shuffled along to the pushing front (a T junction). Right was an undescended pitch. Left was where we started surveying.

We surveyed for about 100m through sandy rifts, down a few climbs (that were much harder on the way up!) and past some pretty flowstone. The passage ended with a ~20m pitch that can also be traversed over to the left and right. Harry and Charlotte havedubbed this passage "Flowstone Canyon".

Slow, tired progress out saw us leave the cave at about 1am. I stumbled to Garlic Cave to sleep on the slabs outside the camp whilst Charlotte and Harry bivvied in a group shelter at the entrance.

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Survex files on this date:
    caves-1623/290/twowettwotight
    caves-1623/320/320
    caves-1626/359/flowstone_canyon
Wallets on this date:
    2023#05 Flowstone canyon ['notes_flowstone_canyon_2', 'elev_flowstone_canyon_1', 'notes_flowstone_canyon…
    2023#08 elizabeth line ['twowettwotightplan', 'twowettwotightee', 'wetshitelowleadsexytopo.tar', 'cove…
    2023#15 320|1623/320 Unglückliche Gämsenhöhle Unlucky Gemse was 2023-hbrw-04 ['Unlucky Gamse in-cave-notes', 'Unlucky Gamse elev', 'Unlucky Gamse plan']
Logbook trips on this date:
    Garlic - Garlic Cave Set up + First Nights
    Basecamp - Nerd faff
    Fishface - Pushing deep Fishface
    Amphitheatre - Following up on Radost and Honorata's prospecting leads (Unlucky Gemse cave and Amphitheatre cave)
    Homecoming - Beyond Watershed in Homecoming Flowstone Canyon