The intrepid Pawel Skoworodko from Speleoclub Warsaw (or Speleoklub Warszawski), Poland first met Mark Stover and Robert Monczka while helping out on the Bill Stone expedition to Cheve in Mexico last year. Pavel was such a cool guy that Mark and Robert invited him to the States for a couple months of caving and fun. It turns out that Pawel has a great photographer's eye and after returning to his home country he posted some of his Germany Valley photos to Speleoklub Warszawski's gallery. Incidentally, while Pawel was in action in Memorial Day cave last November and December a virgin canyon passage bypass that he pushed was named in his honor, the Polish Loop.

Lewis Carrol and Pawel Skoworodko return from Memorial Day Cave, Germany Valley, West Virginia

Andrew Medley took a few of his chums to bop and crawl around in a perennial favorite here in Germany Valley, Harper's Pit. They took lots of pictures and I must say, what a nice looking bunch of cavers. Hope they'll come back to the valley for a visit, then we can show them around to some of our other favorites.


Andrew Medley and friends are ready to climb out of the Harper's Pit entrance drop - photo credit - Andrewmedley.com

And they thoughtfully put together a very attractive photo album to tell the tale of their trip. Enjoy it here.


Joann Smith guides in Memorial Day Cave

On March 12th Tom Barton, Rick Orben, Jim Gildea and Barry Horner returned to Shovel Eater to continue the dig effort beyond the small break through reached in our effort two weeks prior. While they dug, I was taking in the warm temperatures of Napa Valley, too far away to participate, but wishing them well all the same.

By the end of the day they had knocked a lot of rock off the right hand wall (going in) and widened the breezy crack in the floor enough that they could get in a half body length. To summarize, the air still blows very strong from the crack, and they now have a respectable echo returning from the depths of the crevice. We could be getting close to another breakthrough soon.

Peg's MDC Trip report is online in the Central Ohio Grotto's newsletter COG Squeaks and photos from her trip are available here

Ava and Peg in MDC

The largest gathering of diggers ever (six all told) descended upon the snowy flanks of North Fork Mountain to pursue the dig in Shovel Eater cave. Known since the 1980's as an airy lead, Shovel Eater is now developing the reputation of a cave that only slowly gives up its secrets. See the big news from this latest effort at: A Breakthrough (of sorts) in Shovel Eater



Profile of the dig in Shovel Eater cave after the weekend of February 26, 2005 (not to scale) - copr. Devin Kouts

There's been a lot of caving going on in Germany Valley these last few years. Many reports from those exploits exist on the web and are interesting reads. But they can be hard to locate and for the sake of disk space they will not be replicated here. Instead they will be merely linked to as available. For instance, the following online stories and photo albums exist as of the date of this post:


Jeff McCracken and Craig Stihler at the Schoolhouse Cave bat gate - photo by Devin Kouts

Caving in Germany Valley

Hellhole
Hellhole Survey Images

Schoolhouse Cave
Schoolhouse Survey September 24th & October 5th 2004
Schoolhouse Cave Survey Reports - 11SEP04
Schoolhouse Cave Images

Memorial Day Cave
Memorial Day Cave Survey Report, February 2005
Memorial Day Cave Working Map Data - password required
Memorial Day Cave Working Map, February 2005
Memorial Day Cave YO Survey - January 2005
Memorial Day Cave January 2005 & the PH Survey
Memorial Day Cave Camp December 10-12, 2004
Memorial Day Cave Weeklong Trip Report December 2004
Memorial Day Cave Trip Report The Pearl Harbor Passage
Memorial Day Cave November 12-14, 2004
Memorial Day Cave Widening the Puppet Buster, December 2004
Memorial Day Cave Photo Trip, September 13, 2003
Memorial Day Cave Survey Project Website
Memorial Day Cave Images
Memorial Day Cave FLAD Survey Trip March 12 2004
Memorial Day Cave Photos from the FLAD survey
Memorial Day Cave More FLAD survey photos
Memorial Day Cave Working Map, May 2003
Memorial Day Cave Bill Stone survey, October 2003
Memorial Day Cave survey trip photos, April 2003
Memorial Day Cave Flood event report, May 10, 2003
Memorial Day Cave Trip Report, April 2003
Memorial Day Cave Columbia Canyon discovery report, January 2003
Memorial Day Cave pictures from Columbia Canyon, April 2003
Memorial Day Cave Working Map, December 2002
Memorial Day Cave Survey - May 11, 2002
Memorial Day Cave North & South Passage Surveys, April 2002
Memorial Day Cave North Passage survey photos, April 2002
Memorial Day Cave First Survey Trips, March 2002
Memorial Day Cave Pictures from the Scoop 2 discovery, February 2002
Memorial Day Cave Breakthough Report, January 2002
Memorial Day Cave Images from the initial dig effort

Shovel Eater Cave
Shovel Eater Cave Dig Log
Shovel Eater Cave Cave Dig Report, February 2005
Shovel Eater Cave Cave Dig Report #2, December 2004
Shovel Eater Cave Cave Dig Report #1, December 2004
Shovel Eater Cave Cave Dig Report, June 2004
Shovel Eater Cave Cave Dig Report, May 2004
Shovel Eater Cave Cave Dig Report, March 2004
Shovel Eater Cave Cave Dig Report, February 2004
Shovel Eater Cave Images

Kimble Pit
Kimble Pit Report, January 2005
Kimble Pit Report, May 2004
Kimble Pit Report #1, April 2004
Kimble Pit Report #2, April 2004
Kimble Pit Report, February 2004

AKWA Cave
Starting the dig at AKWA Cave, April 2002
AKWA Cave Dig Trip Report, May 2002
AKWA Cave Dig Trip Report Number 2, May 2002
AKWA Cave Final Dig Report, June 2002
AKWA Cave Images
AKWA Cave Last Word, July 2004

NSS Convention 2000 Cave
NSS Convention 2000 Cave Images

Coon Cave
Coon Cave Trip Report with photos, December 2002
Coon Cave Trip Report, December 2002
Coon Cave Historic Note
Coon Cave Dig Trip Report, undated
Coon Cave Images

Harman Pit
Harman Pit Survey Report, December 2001
Harman Pit Map and Images
Harman Pit Images

Miscellaneous caves and ridgewalking
Virginia Creeper Cave, image
Laeger Cave, February 1999
Edwards Cave, March 2003
20 Acre Lake Pit Images
Desolation Pit
Miscellaneous Germany Valley Caves, October 2002
MUSG Images
More MUSG Images
Allen Property Cave Survey & Map, February 2003
Allen Property Cave Images
Carcass Cavity, February 2003
Gating Apex Cave, March 2003
Miscellaneous Cave images in Germany Valley
Judy Spring Images

The Germany Valley Grotto website is relaunched. Earlier attempts to employ open source php-based content management systems did not work out as originally desired. This latest site is based in the capable and easily manageable "Simple PHP Blog" at:
http://www.bigevilbrain.com/sphpblog/

posted by KVMAPR