Saturday 21st February - Minera Mine / Grand Turk Passage Cave

A trip to Minera mine in the hope of finding the elusive 'Grand Turk Passage'.

Meet at 9:00AM Saturday at the car park near the Cabin Shaft.

SRT kit optional as we may rig the entrance rather than use ladders. We may also find a shaft inside to take a peek down...this is believed to be the way to the GTP.

For further details speak to Marc.

Don't forget your knee pads boys & girls.

Last time I did Minera I cracked a rib crawling over a rather large pointy rock.

Bloody awful place.

Brakeman wrote:

Don't forget your knee pads boys & girls.

I cracked a rib crawling over a rather large pointy rock.

.

owch.which mine did you do in minera

Leahy Mike wrote:

Brakeman wrote:

Don't forget your knee pads boys & girls.

I cracked a rib crawling over a rather large pointy rock.

.

owch.which mine did you do in minera

As it was around May 2000 can't remember the name, but I do recall, driving up the hill to just about the top.
On the right hand side of the hill as you reach a bend , I think a capped shaft with steel lid, it was a winch trip, then the rest of the way was mostly low
and lots of crawls on loose rock. Didn't think much of the mine either, shame as was expecting a good trip. Never been back since. Funny thing is I do remember we all had to show BCRA insurance, before we were let down the shaft.

As it was around May 2000 can't remember the name, it sounds like pool park if you fancy a trip down are neck of the woods any time you would be more than welcome to tag. along regards mike

The trip has now been and gone but was an absolute success! The elusive Grand Turk Passage is no longer so elusive!

Started out at the car park at about 9am. There was just 4 of us: Budgie, Doug, Adam and myself (Marc). We decided not to bother with the electrons and go completely SRT. Abseiled down the Cabin shaft and removed all our kit as we were aware that we had quite a distance to cover. Took the complex route through the mine workings and arrived at the winze at about 1pm. We could have got there quicker but as we all needed our SRT gear we had a large bag each to haul and drag along. The winze was a tricky one to rig but Budgie soon sorted it out and we were all soon down the shaft. After a 25m belly crawl we were at the junction with the Grand Turk Passage. It was well worth all the hard work and the Grand Turk Passage is definitely something to behold and very different from the mines that lay above. Instead of mud we had pebbles, sand and clean washed stone and the passage in places is 5m wide and up to 1.5m high. At one point we found an old divers weight which we thought was interesting. The passage ran for roughly 75m to the north and ended abruptly. From back at the junction it was about 300m to the southern limit where we arrived at what looked like a dried up sump (!?). Interestingly two routes led on. There was a mine passage which led to yet another shaft containing a pair of electron ladders (wonder who they belong to?) and at the bottom of the sumpy bit there was another belly crawl (2ft wide x 1 ft high) which looked a bit like a mine passage but had a scalloped roof. There were old wooden props still in the vertical position holding the entrance to the crawl up (interesting!). As it was getting late we decided not to venture down the belly crawl but to leave that for another future trip. I just hope that it is as dry as this when we return again! Returning now, back at the bottom of the winze I discovered that the belly crawl at the shaft (which is actually a minor stream) runs further on back in the other direction of the shaft (again something to look at on a return trip). Managed to get back to Cabin shaft quite quickly and we were back at the cars at about 4pm.

All of us thoroughly enjoyed the trip which proved to be challenging and rewarding. There's also enough that we didn't get to see, so we're keen to return.

Marc