Anialarra Explos

OUR EXPLORATIONS AT THE PIERRE-SAINT-MARTIN
12 years of expeditions already... (1997-2008)

In the past, we visited the Pierre-St-Martin area (French/Spanish Pyrenees) a few times, but only for "classic caving". In 1988 we did the through-trip of the famous Pierre-St-Martin Cave (SC3->Verna), and bottomed both the Lonné Peyret (-700m) and the Aphanicé (-500m) with it's magnificent 328m free-drop. In 1990 we bottomed the Couey Lotge (-600m), another splendid underground river. In 1997 we spend our first holiday with main goal "exploration". The Anialarra limestone plateau became our playground for the first, and certainly not the last time.

Limestone of Anialarra; at the background is the Pic d'Anie

In the remote Anialarra area, situated in Spain, some exploration waves had swept by in the past. The first one in the early '70ties, resulting in the discovery of the FR1/Gouffre Vaille-que-vaille (-337m), the FR3/Gouffre des Caou-Couges (-420m), the AN3/Pozo Estella (at that time -614m) and AN6/Pozo Frontenac (-406m). All this was a French/Spanish realisation, with a lot of heroism and tragedy, such as the death of young Francis Zamorra during a flood pulse in the pitches of Pozo Estella...
A second (and Belgian) wave followed in the '80ties, with the exploration of the AN51/Pozo de Acuarios (-390 m) that connected to the AN6, soon followed by the connection of AN6 with AN3/Pozo Estella, thus creating the "Anialarra Cave System", 711 m deep and 11 km long!
Despite some other explorations afterwards, one had to wait for a decade for another major discovery. It was again a Belgian club, SC Avalon, who found the the AN506/Pozo de los Ninos, -410m deep, in 1997 and 1998. This cave has got a gigantic pit, called "the Monster" 258m deep.

In 1999, another expedition resulted in the exploration of the AN519/Pozo Ibarra, -347m deep, with another big pit: the 222m deep "Extremist". This cave became the fourth entrance of the Anialarra System and opens up great possibilities for re-exploring this system. The 1999 expedition also found the AN534/Pozo del Eclipse, pushed to -130m and still going.

In 2000 another big expedition was organized. A big part of the cave system was resurveyed; and at a depth of -650 m, close to the end of the cave, a new part was discovered which totals over 350 m of cave-passage. In this part there is a realistic chance to get passed the terminus of the cave one day!

In 2001, we worked mainly in the upstream parts of the cave and made some very nice discoveries (Réseau des Affamées, an upstream rivier).

In 2002, a very important breakthrough was made in the upstream parts of the cave. A giant fossil gallery was explored over 650m: Réseau Nostradamus.

During the 2003 and 2004 expeditions we explored almost 3 km of new passages in that part of the cave. The highlight is a giant gallery, over 600m long and with a passage that is 50 m wide... all the time!

The 2005 expedition finally delivered the downstream continuation of the cave. We got through the terminal boulder choke, and explored a giant part with big rooms and very decorated fossil galleries.

The 2006 expedition became the icing on the cake. Three times we went to Anialarra, five weeks of caving fun in total. We re-discovered the river, explored many kilometres of magnificent galleries, found an important inlet that was explored over 750 m, and drastically changed the depth of the cave, for the very first time in more than 20 year!. The cave is now -731 m deep for a total length of 20,3 km.

In 2007, things were going well, we were pushing the river further and further, when suddenly disaster struck. Annette, one of the team leaders, got hit by a falling boulder and got severely injured. A 3-day rescue operation was necessary to get her out of the cave. But The expedition was not a failure, the cave grew to 21,3 km in length and -735,5 m in depth.

In 2008 all misery was soon forgotten, because this episode became one of the best ever. There was not only the come-back of Annette, but also the cave went on and on. The most downstream terminus (Trémie Crimson) could not be passed yet, but in the Tintin River we had fun for weeks. This river was explored further and further, during long, difficult and exposed trips. The Anialarra system grew 3 kilometers and now totals 24,3 km, for a depth of -739 m. We also made significant progress in other caves, e.g. in the AN60 where we finally arrived in a series of pitches, after having worked for many years in a very narrow meander.

Since a few years we award an expedition member with this trophy. We give it to somebody who has shown exceptional team-spirit and effort.

This original trophy is made of a piece of limestone and a stack of totally worn pulleys of our Petzl descenders. In 1999 we started exploring the Pozo Ibarra with its 222 m pitch. After three weeks all of our descenders were worn to the bolt.

In 2008 Tjerk Dalhuizen (Speleo NL) was awarded this trophy. He can put it on a nice spot in the house, for a whole year!

If you want more information about the Pierre-St-Martin mountains and about other caving clubs that are exploring there, then I recommend you the ARSIP website, and more precisely their links-page: http://arsip.free.fr

Many thanks goes to De Berghut in Hamme, one of the best, if not THE best outdoor store in Belgium, and to Camping Ibarra, the best caving camping of the Northern Hemisphere (more precisely located in the French Pyrenees!