Lost Johns' extension B.Smith

On Saturday, Feb. 23rd nine bods set off to cast an aspercious eye on Colin Hall's extension to Lost Johns' System which he misguidedly found last year. In an effort to keep dry we traversed over Battle Axe Pitch on stemples put in by some stout-hearted individual. This gave us a dry descent of about 40' to a rock bridge which just fits six bods provided all breathe in turn. From here a dry descent can be made of Thunderstorm pitch. This luxury was heightened by the gurgles and groans of another party on the normal descent.

After coffee and biscuits in Lyle Cavern (all part of the Batty service) we pressed on to the crawl. This is found by following the stream passage and turning right just before the final cascade. The water level in the crawl was lowered, the roof was raised and the labourers still couldn't make it. However, we took advantage of their efforts and three of us oozed through. We found ourselves in a twenty foot aven which is an easy climb. After struggling up this a short passage led us to a 40' aven. Somehow I arrived at the top struggling in the rear. Another short crawl brought us to a large stream passage. Upstream is an immense aven, 100'+ with a stream trundling out of the roof. This we think is the Lost Pot inlet. Downstream is a second aven of similar dimensions but dry, and then the passage closed down to a slit, we got about 30' along this in the roof and we could hear a large stream far below.