After a Sunday spent fixing, filling, sleeping and eating, Monday saw us head to Ressel for the dive I had been planning for some time – the deep circuit which takes us to a max depth of 70 metres for about 2.7 kilometres total travel distance. 

This dive done open circuit requires six stages, three for bottom gas and three deco/travel gases.   The stages in this picture are all to be carried by me.  The RBs take four stages and each of us had twinsets on which were intended for redundancy alone.

Working together the large amount of kit required was carted down the goat track to the river quite quickly and we ate lunch in a very civilised manner before kitting up.  The water level was way down on where it had been on Thursday.  I got in first and spent some time arranging my stages in a way that I was comfortable with for each of the drop which were to come, clipped off my scooter and rested in the 24 degree river water.

Simon came in next, then John and we set off for the cave mouth which is about 50 yards downstream.  After about 20 yards the river got very, very shallow indeed and John who was in the lead was unable to make any progress at all.  We were effectively beached – the weir had been opened and the river had emptied.  

John stripped his rebreather off in the water and helped drag our stages and scooters down to the cave, then in a combination of dragging, pulling and crawling we made it into slightly deeper water on the right of the river and wondered how stupid we must look for all this gear in perhaps 6 inches of water.  

Finally, one hour after we got into the water for what should have been a one minute journey, we made it into the cave, dropped our O2 bottles, and chilled out for a minute or two to try to relax.  I started to wonder how my bladder would cope after an extended dive as I had ensured that I was well hydrated prior to the dive – oh well, time would tell.

We set off and within 10 metres or so viz was down to perhaps half a meter.  Very worried that this would continue I got into touch contact with the line but it was river water which had pocketed in the cave at a certain depth and we travelled in between clear cave water and brown warm river water for some time. 

The repercussion of this is that, at one stage the mainline travels over to the left for a distance, through a very tight part of the tunnel.  It is not normal to travel right by the line here as there is more space over to the right but in these conditions we had no choice and scooters and stages had to be dragged through.  Finally, the river water was left behind and we could hammer down and get going.     We reached the shaft and started the drops and switches at the top and half way down the shaft. 

In cave we tend to breathe stages for a little less than half their contents then drop the bottles so that we can pick them back up on the way out.  A circuit is a little different as you will not necessarily be coming back the same way and bottles have to be carried throughout. 

The plan was that I would drop a stage at the intersection of the deep and shallow sections as this is the last part of the route where we would retrace our steps. I was disappointed to reach drop pressure before that point but staged the gas on the line and signalled that I was ready to set off again, only to be confronted with the intersection and our planned drop point about ten metres further on.  We had made it after all.

We turned left on to the deep route and John took over the lead. The cave gradually drifted down into the mid 60s and the quality of the line deteriorated.  In places there were two lines, there was monofilament (which is almost impossible to see and would destroy any scooter prop that it got caught in) the mainline was laid in a confusing way, crossing the tunnel from far left to far right in a way which made you feel that the tunnel was changing direction but it wasn’t really. 

We were about 30 minutes from the bottom of the shaft when the cave did a dramatic switch back, around and back like a corkscrew which was really cool.  Simon was bringing up the rear and pulled off his wing inflate just as John and I went through the switchback.   He stopped, connected it again and found that he could not see the tunnel ahead.  I had stopped on the other side and saw his light searching around – shining my light back I was about to turn round when he came through.  John had returned to check all was well and we regrouped and set off again.  It was around here that I switched to my last bottom stage.

The Ressel is many caves in one.  From the Large geometric shaped blocks of white limestone in the early part of the cave, to the ribbons of heavily sculpted rock in the mid section, the walls are rougher back in the deep section, knarled with shells and pebbles with a floor which is very sandy in places.

We entered a very narrow section of cave which I realised was where we had thumbed the dive two days earlier.  About 40 minutes now from the bottom of the shaft I knew that we were only perhaps 10 minutes from the stage that I dropped at the junction and sure enough it soon loomed into view.  I still had 150 bar in the bottom stage I was using so I just hip clipped this one and carried on moving out.

Back at the shaft, I picked up my 36 metre gas and called the first of our stops.  I took this opportunity to sort out all my bottles, grouping together all the 80s into a bouquet on one leash to clear some space for the bottles that I would soon have to pick up.

Deco, which I ran, was spent reflecting on a cool dive.  Switches were made and stops were carried out dependent on the tunnel profile, where we could make progress we did so but when the tunnel rose beyond the deco ceiling we stopped until able to continue.   The exit through the tighter section of main passage was now very difficult with very floaty bottom stages on leashes but we eventually got back to the cave mouth and our O2 bottles.

I called three cycles of O2 (12 minutes on followed by a 6 minute back gas break) and we settled into the cave ceiling to relax and enjoy the slightly warmer river water which was creeping in at this point.

We were about 20 minutes through the deco when Simon’s rebreather started dumping gas alarmingly, one of his first stages was freeflowing.  John sought to assist whilst Simon shut down the stage through his switch block, and I hung in front of Simon ready to donate gas if necessary.  He was relaxed and there was never any big deal about the problem.  It helped pass some time though and before we knew it, it was time to leave.

We chilled out in the river for a few minutes and then did a homemade PFO test – which left John a little tired – the magnum scooter came up without batteries though. We celebrated back at the hotel with a more French food and some champagne.  Job well done.