DYO Corbels chamber

Having spent the Saturday attending the CDG AGM near Crickhowell I was looking forward to a day underground. As I was just recovering from a cold I had the previous week, diving was out so a dry trip was planned into the Corbels inlet in DYO with Andrew. The aim of the trip was to carry a length of thick walled hose pipe into the inlet to set up as a siphon so that we can drain the static sumps in the passage.

Turning up in the car-park, we parked out of the way of the tourists to change before strolling into the show cave with the pipe. Corbels chamber is close to the entrance but still required us to wade through the lakes before doing a short section of dry caving that includes a good variety of passage. The water levels were low and the water was warm (if your wetsuit fitted well; like mine LOL ) with very little flow. On the way in we took our time and admired the plentiful formations.

The final passage into Corbels chamber is a bedding crawl with beautiful formations to each side before a final thrutch up into the chamber itself.

In the chamber we quickly found Corbels inlet passage; our chosen target. This passage like the rest of DYO has been tapped to guide cavers clear of the formations thereby protecting them. Halfway up the passage towards the sump we found that the route ahead had been tapped off. We had no alternative but to abandon the plan and retreat so that we could consult with the Cave Access Committee to see what the next move will be.

We made our exit to a sunny day. Waterproof seat covers were put in place and we drove along the valley to the SWCC hut to change out of our wetsuits away from the show cave customers before the drive back home. On arrival we found two happy looking pigs.