back from Crete and the Lion!

Back safe... much to write about, including the transcription of my first paper diary in years!

Recent news

So - the 2nd Balkan Speleo Reunion Camp is over (news coming soon, I hope), the 4th European Speleo Congress is coming soon (I am booking transport and accommodation this week) and I am getting myself ready for the lion (this one on Crete).

Too much to write about...

But is it art?

So a few weeks ago, one fine Sunday morning, I set off from home to go up to the cave of the Lion on Hymettus. The idea was that Katerina, one of our new members and a fine arts student at the University of Athens would be doing something for her final exam piece and needed this to be done in a cave.

The lion is a nice little cave. Currently being excavated by the ephorate of pal/spel of southern Greece. It used to have the digs open to the air and dangerous, but they have been covered with nice iron grating. The rubbish dump in 2006 used to be full of shards that had been missed by the sieve-monkeys. Last week it seemed to have washed away in the rains we have had since then.

So - what's this all about?

Well, the idea is that Katerina would play Al Gore's documentary: "An inconvenient truth" inside the cave and record this. The recording would then be taken up mount Olympus and nailed to the living rock along with recordings of other things Katerina has prepared (video of a globe being eaten up by bacteria, something to do with the double helix of the human DNA, etc).

The concept of recording something else playing in an environment which is totally alien to video and TVs with stalagmites in the background and no movement or sound is kooky enough. But is it art?

2nd Balkan Caving Camp

I am happy to announce from the blog that the Balkan Speleological Union (BSU) has decided to entrust the organisation of the second Balkan Caving Camp to the Hellenic Federation of Speleology. The camp, according to the information currently available on the FHS website indicates that the camp is to take place in Northern Greece between 13 and 22 June 2008.

Archedemos and friends

It's Bjork!! in the national archaeological museum of Athens!!!

Cave of Zeus on Zas, Naxos

Well, it's big and its dark and I need to go back because I didn't explore it as much as I would have liked.



The most amazing thing was the number of tourists trying to get up there in the midday sun with flip-flops, no hats and no water (and of course, no torches).

The cave itself is mainly a large breakdown chamber with some interesting bits for exploring into the "floor". Most of the floor is covered by a black slime, which looks like it could be many centuries of sheep shit, but I may be wrong. There are shards everywhere as well, mostly coarse, but some recognisable as classical. I hope to write more when the photos come and I have processed the sketch map I made on site.

Farewell Zenas

The Greek caving community is mourning the sudden loss of Ioannis Zenas. Iannis maintained the site Spilaio for years and initiated the very popular WCN which did a great deal to further the dissemination of caving news internationally.



You will be missed.

New personal depth record

My new personal best for depth is now -315m, after a good long stint in Propantes. a group of us went up at the weekend with enough rope to rig a good 250 meters beyond the lead we were intending to push, but things (starting with the strength of the rock, but also the morphology of the place) were against us.

The rest of the group - everyone apart from Erato and myself went through the narrows at -315m into the "new sections" of the cave but came to a dead end a little further than they had gone last month. There is still a lot more work to be done.

And of course, the weather was fine while we were entering and while we were inside (although it was raining inside from the drippings of the humidity) and a little before the last man came out, the rain started. It drizzled, then it picked up, then it worsened, then it got better - like this, right up until about two pm the next day - so we packed our tents and got everything together in the rain, and mud everywhere, in the cave, out of the cave, in our hair, in our sleeping bags - mud everywhere.

Anyway - I am not as hampered by excesses of lactic acid as I was during my first wisit to the cave, but I am a little sore here and there and a little bruised from my chest harness.

In all though, the new personal best was worth it, as was the fun to be had all weekend with the other boys and girls.

Back to Parnon

I spent last weekend up on the Paliochora plateau again, the last weekend of the season. Next year again - and all of winter to complete the write-ups.

This weekend, going back to Parnon, a little further south, this time, to the famous Propantes. Currently at -315m officially, a little more in practice and hopefully, by this time tomorrow, a lot more in practice. I am not making any promises about writing anything about this, as this year has been a difficult one for keeping up to date on the blog or more generally. I have only just managed to put up my report on Paloumba (January 2005)!

Stuff that’s not been done…

Well, there’s a whole bunch of stuff that’s not been written about. It’s very hard to balance when the workplace has demands which are logical in their bread-on-table-way, but sometimes irrational in their pressing nature. The most important and pressing of things that’s not been done is a decent write up of the latest adventures at Dersios, where we have been going about once a month since June and where we have been surprised again this year with what we have found.

I have picked up a new survey programme called Therion and I have slowly been transferring the survey data from Dersios over to Therion to make the survey look a little better than it has been looking in the past.

I also owe a proper write up of the Kastelorizo adventure, including the discovery of three vertical caves, two of about 10-15m, one with a surveyed depth of 60 odd which continues. For these I need to finish the survey and then write them up, the sooner the better, especially since the people at the ministry are getting frisky and are phoning me for my report – never known them to do that before! But especially since we are thinking of going back, which means that we have to ask the ministry again, and they will ask me about my report for March and then yadda yadda yadda, you know. For that I have been trying to learn Therion too. Almost there. Almost to the point where we will be able to produce a pencil-less survey (yeah so I use a biro inside the cave).

Anyway – so why the sudden guilt trips and writing splurge?

Well, like I said, things are tough in RL and when things are tough in RL you cling to dreams and dreams are stuff that you think about when you day dream and when you are on the Attiki Odos doing 130 km/h in heavy traffic but your mind is on a mountain underground. Until recently all I have thought about has been Dersios and how the rocks change colour from one part to the other and what things are like at the end of the third sump and dammit when will someone manage to reach the end of the third sump and tell us what lives there?

Recently, though, something else has gotten hold of the imagination and has started sneaking itself into my mind’s eye - somewhere en-route to work after the Kifissias ring road when all the Derios daydream is coming to a close and there it comes, the new, the unknown, the challenge that will keep me busy to get ready and for which I will probably never be physically ready for, try as I might.

There has always been this thing about superlatives – you know – there would not be much point in having them in a language if they did not captivate and motivate. My "Every Boy's Handbook" from the late seventies, just when I was proficient enough to read it, was crammed full of interesting things like semaphore and rank diacritics of uniformed soldiers and whatnot, but it also had page upon page of superlatives: the longest, the tallest, the oldest, the hottest, the coldest – superlatives fascinate boys almost as much as sergeants’ stripes and capital cities.

But to reach the superlatives, one must do a whole lot of training and spend a whole lot of money on gear and kit, and this will be difficult.

We had a first meeting of the team who will be going for it and we set a tentative date in August of next year.

I hope to write about it, as regularly as my mood will take me and as regularly as my work allows. It’s superlative for Greece at –1,208m (about four times deeper than my personal deepest), but only about place 34 on a global scale. Still, the opportunity to cross the km mark will be present, and if I am conscientious enough in my training and if I eat all my greens, maybe I too will be there with the big boys who were gathered last night at the club to begin to plan the attack.

Dreams and superlatives then, but first: work, then clearing the backlog – how very prosaic.

Palpable excitement

The ninth Panhellenic Speleological Convention starts this evening down in Monemvasia, five hours drive. I will be going down with a bunch of people from the club.

Should be a fun weekend.

First pitch - Katerina video

Propantes April 2005

Back here: old post on Propantes I wrote (not at very much length) about going to Propantes in Arkadia.

I have got my act together with youtube now and am happy to present a small video of our adventure that weekend. I hope you enjoy.

Plans for weekend 15-16 July

Part of the survey showing the deepest explored sections of the sinkhole.

The plans for the weekend of 15-16 July involve diving the sump at top left (true north is up) and creating a better survey of the immediate area. The passage leading south is all underwater and probably needs neoprene. It joins with the end of last year's new exploration through a 70m dive.

Back to Dersios - 2006 season

Well, some of the other boys and girls have already gone back, some of them starting on their fourth season of exploration at the Dersios Sinkhole. The optimism in the group is high with strong feelings that this year we'll push through to something good.

We are only one step away from potentially virgin passage, although that step is a biggish one involving diving two sumps in succession.

The weekend of 15-16 July will be spent on preparation for the dive, which is expected later on in the season.