United Cavers Exploration Team

Location
SJ 022 694

Directions
From Henllan head to St. Asaph but take the left turn to Cefn (and Bont Newydd) about 1 mile out of the village. Follow this single track road past a woodland and steeply down hill passing a property called “Cyffredin” (it’s on the left and it’s the only one). Park as soon as possible and walk back to that property where there is a public footpath passing around it and behind â€" take that. The footpath comes to a stream very quickly â€" walk up that as close to the stream as you can.

The cave is in the left bank a little way up.

Access
None Known

Suggested Equipment
None

Length
Up to 1100 feet

Flood risk
There is a very significant risk of flooding (including flash flooding in rainfall) and there are known sumps in the cave.

Cave Attributes
A (mostly) tight phreatic passage

Description
A water resurgence cave (believed to come from Dell cave) at the side of the river Meirchion which mostly doesn’t have water running during the summer.

An obvious entrance at the side of the river (easy to miss if you are not walking in the stream or you are on the wrong side to see it).

After only 30 feet from the bank, the cave reduces to a crawl (hands & knees in places and belly crawl in places) for around 100 feet then there is a tight corner which collects silt/mud and requires emptying before it can be passed.

When the weather is wet it is not possible to get beyond that point and, so far, “the beyond” remains lost to this postee.

An apparent new lifeform was discovered here around 2005 by two local cavers (photo below) and this was preserved (it was already dead) and sent to Liverpool science museum who could not identify it and whom sent it on to Oxford. It has since vanished from the proverbial radar.

Unexplored Passges
The passage beyond the first sump remains unexplored

Digs
None known.

Links
http://ukcaving.com/wiki/index.php/Afon_Meirchion_Cave

Just inside the entrance where the crawl begins

Looking into the passageway from the entrance (the water is very shallow, it is reflecting in the picture to make it look deep)

Looking back at the entrance having crawled in

Looking backwards from around 50 feet in

PostSubject: Re: Afon Meirchion Cave (Lower)   Fri 27 Mar - 20:04   Reply with quote Edit/Delete this post Delete this post View IP address of poster

The silted sump around 100 feet in

A further examination of the silted sump proves fruitless


The strange lifeform discovered in the cave (100 feet in)


The little silver lifeform can be seen here (to scale) under the elbow