Two groups headed underground today - Ben, Chris and Kieran went downhill, to the Exhalibur entrance. They went down to the sumps that had been discovered last week, and moved the siphon pipes to the Amazing Maze sump area.

They got the siphon going in this area, and the water level started to drop. Anticipation at what lay beyond - it's such a fine line between bitter disappointment and ecstatic breakthroughs.

Troy and Aaron went uphill to the Tomo Thyme Entrance. They followed the now-familiar route to the Blue Hawaii region, and continued exploring the passages off the waterfalls. 230m of new route was surveyed.

Down to the Amazing Maze - the sump had drained, with the siphon going overnight. They went through, where no-one had ever stepped before.

Advancing about 50m, they were greeted with another sump. This looked great to dive - the water was reasonably clear. Much better than the free-dive on the Pipe Dream passage - that sump had zero visibility, the silt completely blocking out any features, the way on negotiated only by trusting the dive line and pulling yourself along it, hand over hand.

Troy and Aaron were climbing again in Blue Hawaii. The passage they were following ended in a solid rock choke, with a strong draft. A promise of more cave somewhere beyond it!

Looking for other entrances to the cave system, on the surface of the karst. There are many sinkholes up here on Mt Arthur, but most go down about 20m, and then are blocked by large boulders, frost-shattered rock deposited here when glaciers moved over the surface long ago.

They found a shaft, which had been previously found and named EK3010. It hadn't been explored far from the surface though.
The team went down ropes, as far as a very tight rift. This time they had a secret weapon - a small caver!

Cavers come in all shapes and sizes, so each is good at different things. Tall cavers are great at bridging across wide passages.
Short and thin cavers are excellent for exploring small passages!

Petite Dee managed to get through the rift, named Undeniable Rift, continuing until she reached the top of another pitch, needing a rope to go down it.

Back to the EK3010 entrance, the team surveyed down to the rift. Next they spent some time at the rift, digging it out so it was big enough for normal people to just pass down.

Ever deeper - virgin passage again, where no person has ever been since the world began! This is awesome stuff! The route continued, dropping down 3 more pitches, until the way on appeared to be choked by rockfall.

There was air movement, so there was cave beyond. They removed rocks, digging through into a steep descending tube and another pitch.
At bottom of this pitch the wind blew across another shaft.

Climbing across, a small tube was found. One by one they carefully crawled down this tube until they were stopped at a tight spot.

A long day exploring; as they climbed back up the ropes they surveyed all the new passage - it was 120m deep.

While most of the group were in the rift, Aaron and Barnabe went up the nearby Flying Machine series to look at leads. They discovered one passage, which was an oxbow - a passage that the river once took but then eroded a shorter route, leaving the oxbow behind.

Aaron and Troy did a classic through trip, going into the cave system at the Tomo Thyme entrance, and coming out lower down the hill, at the Exhalibur entrance. This takes about 10 hours of hard caving, constantly climbing and abseiling through the underground passages.

The rest of the team went back into EK3010. Continuing from where they left off yesterday, they got through the squeeze and then quite literally dropped into a large chamber.

A canyon at the base of the squeeze was blowing lots of air out. Following the flow of air, they were led up a pitch. Then they abseiled down a very rocky loose gravel pitch for 25m into the floor of the big chamber.
Of the several possible exits from this chamber, only one seemed to be taking the airflow.

Clambering along a passage, up a 4m climb, they were then stopped at the top of a 10m pitch. The walls were very loose, and large bolts were needed to secure the rigging and tie the rope on.

Surveying the day's discoveries, 100m were added, with 50m in depth. This cave entrance was now 298m long and 171m deep. Only 130m or so to go to connect to Tomo Thyme and the rest of the main system. Will they do it??

Sadly the three weeks were up, and this was the last trip of the expedition. As they climbed upwards, they pulled all the hardware (the bolts, rigging tape and so on) out of the cave.

Departing from the mountain. A huge amount of cave has been surveyed, passages beyond sumps reached, avens climbed, and still the caves keeps going, slowly revealing her secrets!

A total of over 2.5km has been added to the survey, some huge passage, some small. They have paved the way for the 1000m connection - it's never been closer!!
They have also opened up the way for cave diving towards the Pearse. Both projects will be excellent new chapters in the continuing exploration of the Ellis System.