Cormac strikes again

aricooperdavis

Member
Area Moderator
At the start of this year Merlyn pointed out to me an exciting new hole that was opening up by the side of the road heading up to Bawden Manor Farm.

Sadly, Cornwall Council didn't share my enthusiasm for this development, and swiftly tasked Cormac with making it safe...

The temporary solution of heras site fencing between an active highway and an open mine shaft was short lived, and unfortunately so was the "permanent" solution of pushing some dirt over the mineshaft with a digger.

I await the next installment of this gripping tale with interest.

Good dog, Merlyn.

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Just bumped into this, the shafts in the area have stone collars and some have stone "domes" over the top. These domes/collars have a habit of moving. Most of the shafts are pretty deep to water there, like 100m+
 
You can get into these consolidated mines in a few places, and I'm in the process of surveying them to see if there are any links that could be refound/dug, but I've not managed to get this far North West yet.

The hole on the surface is now quite a bit wider and knee deep.
 
You are aware the OS shaft names are wrong? We went in via park shaft, which is to the north of south park shaft (the one on the OS). We got into seal hole and went up the adit a long way and missed a couple of side tunnels, but didn't get as far as north seal hole mine. We went all the way down Park shaft (there are 3 levels) and the bottom one went west towards the big sunken area. We got to a shaft with ladders with mustard colour gunge running down it (modern-ish). We couldn't get to the east pell area from the park shaft area but during capping footway shaft (by the road in the rockies house garden) that was open to water. The guys ran out of rope at 110m and it was plugged the next day. We capped North Pell Shaft and left access in. It was 99m to a choke, but there was a drive to the massive subvertical "north house lode". This would be the way back into seal hole section and possibly back into the seal hole adit. (deep). There's a plan which shows "new pell adit" (seal hole adit) and pell adit (which is a shallow adit which fed the leat, should be an easy dig). If you get off at the second level at park shaft (rather than crossing it) you go west along a level, go along and along and along and then you squeeze through an eye hole "point of pick" where 2 mines met IMO and drop down a tiny bit. That adit is IMO pell adit (shallow). The adit which is the first one you get in on is a shallow one which fed the dressing floors in rocky valley. We dug through a collapse, went around another footway shaft (which doesn't go at depth, but is open to water) and that is flooded. That comes out or came out in a bungalow garden, according to old PCG journals. The east pell adit (which is the deep flowing one in polberro cove) goes back towards old polberro mine and Tredenna Shaft (with the fence around it, which goes into some workings) connects. These workings don't connect with the East Pell ones. We also went down Primrose shaft (quite exciting) and tried getting downstream (via trevaunance adit) to Turnavore section. It was sumped. The next one is when you go down to the valley adit via park shaft, get into stoping, turn east, then go through a tunnel, down the shaft with the railings around it, then head ummmm, south, I think, you get into 2 flat lodes, the second one you climb, get into another level (higher than what is at that point east pell adit) and then find an upturned wagon, there's a very wet tunnel which almost sumps and ends in a shaft choke. This is perhaps the one on the HJ maps called "wheal friendly" (but is not wheal friendly engine shaft). In the Wheal Quoit estate (I think). Going upstream from Primrose shaft gets into odds and bits, but ultimately ends in what I think is the tip-choked WF engine shaft. I had my work hat on and looked down WFES which is choked about 60ft down. I think they pushed the tip into it.

I know the woman who owns the wheal trevaunance site and has about 5 shafts which are fitted with clwyd caps from operation minecap. Looking at old plans, one of these was missed and IMO should be there/openable. That's one way in. The other one is the one we left access in. We also went down north seal hole east shaft (mega hole) which is choked about 70m, this goes into some workings and a bit of stoping and it connects with another shaft which was dropped to water with nothing off. IMO, there are workings UP this shaft. Going back to wheal park shaft, heading north, you get to a shaft which is sollared over at adit. We maypoled up this into a proper museum of stuff. Wheal Squidler I think it is. Where the stoping (north dipping) crosses the adit, it's run in. There was a collapsed level this horizon off footway shaft (rockies garden again).

We started bolting down the cliff to get into "the top hole" of penhalls, which I think goes. Had the coastguard out for that one when the lifeguards spazzed.
 
The pell adit ends in a collapsed shaft and there is a 40cm or so band of comby quartz, which I think is the seal hole crosscourse. This is in the ceiling of the cave. They had problems with seal hole adit collapsing (as the ground to the side of the quartz is shit) back when it was working. We just broke the clay dams down and went as far as we could but had to turn back as it was a mega job and the tide was coming in. It is possible you could get into workings off the side drive of seal hole adit, climb them, then get into pell adit and carry on along there.
 
Hi Stu. Did you completely digitalise "The Box" , stuff drom the old Plymouth Mining and Mineral club pre PCG, in the Plymouth central library?
I had a bit of it from Ben S.
If you have done this, it needs to be uploaded to our database when up and running. Save people the fuel driving down to Plymouth. LOL
I bet you still got that MagnumStar lamp!
 
I still have both lamps, I think the MS is totally fd. The Trigon needs a new battery pack, I think. That was and is still my best lamp ever. I run a scurion 1500 from 2015 and it's a great lamp for more extreme poking, but the Trigon is the king of light in a hole.

I've got all sorts of stuff. You're welcome to bung me a hard drive and I'll load it up for you.
 
I still have both lamps, I think the MS is totally fd. The Trigon needs a new battery pack, I think. That was and is still my best lamp ever. I run a scurion 1500 from 2015 and it's a great lamp for more extreme poking, but the Trigon is the king of light in a hole.

I've got all sorts of stuff. You're welcome to bung me a hard drive and I'll load it up for you.
Email me, I need your current address. Glad to touch base again, it was your batch of Oldhams that started me off on the lamps. I never forget.
 
Crikey, that's a superb information dump, thanks Stu!

That lines up pretty closely with my experience of the place, although I spent my first couple of years exploring it not realising that anything was still accessible off the deep adit level of South Park Shaft, as on my first trip down there it was sumped.

I'm working on a seperate survey to Ben S, as his is centerline only, and I could do with the Therion practice. So far they're aligning very nicely where we've surveyed the same stuff.

I love the access for Wheal Primrose, and do intend to survey the collapse blocking the beach from both ends to assess whether there is any hope of digging enough to lower the water level enough to regain access to the stoping.

PM me your number if you fancy coming on a trip or catching up over a drink some time - I rent in St Agnes so am very close by!
 
In 1998 the Great Wheal Charlotte beach adit was open for a short while, scene of one of my 'adventures'.
 
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