Irish Caves - Back

Eire - County Clare

Underlying most of Ireland are huge beds of Carboniferous Limestone. The structure of the limestone beds is rather like a huge saucer with the edges at the coast being those places where the limestone is exposed and caves can be found. One of the most spectacular areas of limestone exposure is the Burren, on the west coast of Eire, in County Clare. Here there are vast tracts of bare eroded limestone. There are few rivers above ground and those that do appear often disappear and reappear along their course, the water flowing underground in huge conduits to resurge at springs on the edge of Galway Bay. Cave divers are slowly exploring these underground water courses as well as cave systems on the coast formed in the geological past and now inundated by the sea.

There are many cave systems accessible to the 'dry' caver including Pollnagollum, the longest system in Ireland comprising several entrances and many kilometres of passage. Another extraordinary system, the Doolin-Fisherstreet system, has a traverse between two entrances to a point not far from its rising under the sea. At one point it runs under a stream flowing on the surface which partially empties its waters through the roof of the cave!

Visitors to the Burren can get a glimpse of the underground world by visiting Ailwee Cave, which lies in the centre of the Burren. Afficonados of the TV comedy series Father Ted may like to know that much of it was filmed in this area with one episode filmed in the cave.

The caves are characteristics by long winding narrow streampassages often beautifully decorated with stalactite formations. The walls are carved by the stream into fine scallops. Potholes are relatively unusual although they do exist, such as in the system of Poll na gCeim (Cave of the Steps) that descends in a series of deep shafts. Exploration continues to this day. Much of it has been by members of the University of Bristol Speleological Society who have been active in the region for 50 years. They have published an interesting guide book to the caves of this region called Caves of County Clare and South Galway (ISBN 0-9545850-0-3). it's obtainable from their website which also has links for accomodation at the coastal village of Doolin on the edge of the Burren.

Further south in County Kerry is another fine system, Crag Cave, near the town of Castleisland. It is now open to the public after discoveries made by welsh cave diver Martyn Farr in 1983. The cave runs under the drive to the land owner's house and an entrance could be fortuitously excavated in a field next to the drive! The author managed to make a minor discovery with his friend Ted Popham in the same system in 1984, although the trip was rather exciting due to problems with lights!

Coolagh River Cave

This system is very prone to flooding to the roof in heavy rain! Anybody who has visited the cave will be impressed by this knowledge in view of the size of the stream passages.

St. Catherine's to Fisherstreet Pot (the Doolin system)

Pollballiny

This system has the reputation of being arduous. The entrance lies in a row of shakeholes, along the west side of Knockauns Mountain, the points of engulfment for water running off impervious shale onto the limestone. The long narrow winding passage (over a kilometre in length) used to end in a boulder choke but a team from UBSS used a car jack to pass this and shortly after one the biggest cave passages in the region was entered. Unfortunately it becomes blocked by a gigantic choke of boulders extending the full 25 metre height of the passage. The stream has found a new route but it is too small to negotiate. One theory has it that this vast tunnel is just an inlet to an even large cave system yet to be discovered!

Poulnagollor

This short but attractive stream cave lies somewhat off the beaten track and was visited on 2.4.86 by a team of CDG and UBSS members. The sump was dived by Rick Stanton and myself and a 40 metre extension entered. It ends very close to a surface sink.

Cave of the Wild Horses

This extraordinary cave system lies in what is thought to be a fossil polje now inactive in the sense that very little water drains into it. However although only small streams are apparent in the cave, at times water wil well up through the system and emerge from the entrance. This indicates a rise of nearly 60 metres! Needless to say it would be extremely dangerous to be in the cave at such a time so visits should be made in settled weather. The cave has a legend attached to it, namely that in times of flood a herd of wild horses with magical properties will race from the cave. Sadly I have no eyewitness accounts of this event. The hydraulic pressure of the intermittent floods leads to the massive mud banks in the lower reaches being shifted about regularly and explorers have been puzzled to enter passages never noticed before by others, even on well trodden trade routes.

In 1985 Charlie Self, Janet Cooper and myself visited the cave because Charlie wanted to check passage detail for a new guide book to the caves in the area. During the course of the trip I explored a passage described as ending in a series of ducks. In reality it ended in an 8 metre pitch and we returned the next day to explore some fascinating gour lined canals and a mud choked terminal passage dubbed Frog Passage. Linda Mullan one of the team was the first to pass a squeeze holding up progress and this was dubbed 36B squeeze.

Walking across the depression to the entrance that lies under the cliff in the distance	The entrance	Entrance Passage
Entrance passage with trencn	Entrance series	Entrance series
Mud banks in Lower Series	Lower series	Graham Mullan and gours
Gour Passage	Moving along Gour Passage	Charlie Self descending the pitch at the end of Gour Passage
Fluting just below the pitch	36B squeeze	Graham and the fast growing gours
Angie Glanvill and gour dams	Ted Popham and the gours	The canal
Julian Walford in the canal near the far end	Frog Passage	Frog Passage
Terminal Choke

The Submarine and Tidal Caves of Doolin

In Doolin Harbour, the embarkation point for the ferry to Aran Islands. exist a number of submarine caves of a length so far unique in the British Isles. They were certainly known to local divers for some time before my first visit in 1986 but I seemed to have set the ball rolling for further exploration when after a brief foray into several entrances I wrote an article for Descent magazine entitled The lure of the Green Holes, a tongue in cheek reference to the Emarald Isle and the Blue Holes of the Bahamas. Subsequent visits by a number of explorers both from the UK and locally explored systems both below the reef at the entrance to the harbour and further along the coast. There are probably about 2 kilometres of underwater passage so far explored and surveyed and the systems, clearly formed in a previous geological epoch, display considerable complexity and are a haven to many marine species usually found in more sheltered waters. Futher along the coast are some tidal cave systems, again not sea caves but old cave systems invaded by the sea.The most well known is Urchin Hole reached by an interesting scramble down the limestone cliffs.

Doolin Reef Caves

Urchin Cave

This interesting intertidal/subtidal cave system lies north of Doolin and is not easy to locate. Check tide tables before visiting the site. If the sea is rough it might be sensible to go elsewhere. The entrance is a low bedding slot that opens out into a roomy phreatic tunnel occupied by a variety of marine organisms, some of which are rarely if ever seen on the shore even on low spring tides. The darkness and high humidity allows many creatures to survive exposure to air without harm.

Jim Durston in the bedding passage entrance - daylight just visible in the background	Typical phreatic tube	Jim and a dahlia anemone	Spider crabs
	Wall studded with prolapsed cup corals	Edible sea urchins	Beadlet anemones
Philippa Glanvill in the main passage		Jim examines a cotton spinner

Eire - County Kerry

Crag Cave

This lengthy system is in County Kerry as opposed to most of the caves on this page that in County Clare. We visited in July 1984 not long after the cave had been extended by not only Martyn Farr but also a CDG team from the UK earlier in the year. We were given permission to camp in the grounds of the house under which the cave system lies. The excavated entrance for the show cave lis in a field adjacent to the entrance drive of Crag House. A freediveable sump leads to a passage known as Crag Quarry Passage and, on our July trip, Ted Popham and myself extended the cave to a streamway and boulder choke. The presence of spiders' webs here suggests that the end is not far from Crag Quarry Cave.

The original JK Cave entrance	Ted Popham and Sally Glanvill in the entrance chamber of JK	Ted Popham emerging from JKentrance
Diver's Delight
		The White Tower
	Ted in Ted's Short discovered in July 1984 linking Shanahan Chamber and Crag Quarry Passage
Shanahan Chamber
		Diver's Disgust (far side of the free diveable sump)
False Floor in Crag Quarry Passage	Crag Quarry Passage

Fermanagh

Marble Arch Cave

This big river system has now been elevated to the position of second longest in Northern Ireland after a connection was made to the Cascades/Prod's Pot system in the spring of 2010. About 25 years ago a long held dream of developing it as a show cave was realised and it is now, by far, the most spectacular in the British Isles. To learn more about the place visit the Marble Arch Showcave website. Three underground rivers feed the river that emerges below a cliff just above the eponymous Marble Arch. The first upstream sump can be bypassed to Skreen Hill 2 where a well decorated inlet passage called Legnabrocky Way can be followed for a considerable distance through some large chambers. The system is very flood prone so caution needs to be exercised on visits in unsettled weather.

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