Depth through thought

Editor: guilford@ermine.ox.ac.uk

Editorial

Well, I didn't manage to go caving this weekend, having been suffering from an abscess that required anti-biotics (plundered from the expedition first aid kits). I'm sure lots of you did, but I have no trip reports. So, apologies for the rather thin issue today. Still, I made a visit to sinc a giedd on the Black Mountain, and a very impressive place it is. Apart from DYO, this huge area of limestone drainage is virtually unentered.

Meets Sec's corner

I hope that everyone who went to the Dales at the weekend enjoyed themselves. The next club caving weekend will be at the end of 8th week (4-6th Dec), staying at the WSG (complete with new kitchen). Martin Hicks should be coming: a useful person as he is both an OFD and DYO leader (however, adds the editor, if you plan a trip down OFD 1 with Martin as leader, make sure you take someone who knows the way as well). See you there!
Jo Whistler

El Jefe writes...

Lots of things happening on the expedition planning front at the moment. Tomorrow the expedition committee will be interviewed by the Expeditions Council so that Extremero '99 can gain University recognition. I spent the weekend not caving (grrrr) but at the Royal Geographical Society Expeditions Planning Seminar in London. It gave me lots of ideas about fund raising, sciencey stuff and leadership skills (just what is "visioning"?). I also networked for all I was worth! I'm planning to produce the first expedition bulletin soon, with information about how things are going for distribution to prospective expedition members.
Jo "buzzword bingo" Whistler

PDCMG meeting

After the meeting of the Pwll Ddu Cave Management Group last Sunday Ali Garman and Ben Lovett popped over to the Lamb & Fox to have a chat with Brian. He greatly enjoyed not telling them much about the land sale. For those who don't know, the land containing the Ogof Draenen Entrance is being sold, and no-one yet knows who is going to buy the land.

They then went down to the trench to check that nothing had been removed after members of MCC, SWCC, OUCC and CSS had refilled and landscaped the trench dug outside the entrance. The only thing which had been removed was the log book! There was definitely a log book last Sunday evening, because I removed the used pages for Sue Mabbot's statistics, but by the following Sunday lunchtime it had vanished - there is hopefully a perfectly innocent reason for this. There is currently no log book.

We were intrigued by a small to medium set of Suretred welly prints which only went down the hill and there was no one in the cave. They were fresh, i.e. made since it last rained - Saturday or Sunday morning. They headed off traversing around the hillside all the way to the rescue entrance! On inspection, the rescue entrance has again been reopened and appears to be in use. Several bars had been removed and a large section of heavy duty fencing had also been removed / sawn up. Someone appears therefore to have re-opened the "second entrance" and may be using it regularly.

Ben Lovett, who is now the new conservation officer for Draenen is now considering making a sizeable effort at more effectively capping the rescue entrance.
Ali Garman

Puzzle Corner

Bewilderment at Steve's puzzle corner last week has apparently led him to up his offer and suggest he will buy a pint for the highest scorer. Currently, one correct answer is tops....