Sledi Vetra
Summary of Exploration
As a complement to 'Vodna Sled' (Following / Stalking the Water), this year we 'Sledi Vetra' - Follow the Wind!
Between the 13th of July and 19th of August 2012, Imperial College Caving Club held its 17th expedition to the Migovec Plateau in the Triglav National Park, Slovenia. This was attended by 26 members of the Imperial club, along with 10 cavers from the JSPDT, a local Slovene club with whom we have been cooperating since the first expedition in 1994. The expedition was named “Sledi Vetra” (which translates as “follow the wind"), referencing the practice of following draughts to find the best way on in a cave.
As in the previous two years we setup a 4-person underground camp 550m below the entrance of the cave at a location known as 'X-Ray' to facilitate the logistics of deep exploration. In total 18 ICCC cavers camped underground including three cavers who had been caving for less than a year. They were joined by six slovenian cavers.
A major aim of the last four years of our exploration have been the connection of Vrtnarija to System Migovec. Due to the length of passage we have explored in the mountain since 1994, this would be the longest cave in Slovenia. On the final exploration trip, the two cavers eventually reached a Permanent Survey Station (a cairn of rocks and pencil written note on plastic paper) placed in 1998 in a section of System Migovec named 'Waterloo'. All together, the combined system is the longest in Slovenia at 25.5 km of passage, with a total depth of 972 m and five known entrances.
Closer to the surface, a team did a comprehensive survey of several surface caves. These were caves that had been seen previously but not fully explored. No obvious leads were returned from this but in a separate team explored a promising new cave called Kuk Pot (GPS Coordinate N9) and pushed it to a depth of 25 metres with 29 metres of cave passage. The cave is quite a distance from camp but it shows that there could be many more cave systems waiting to be found.
During the Sledi Vetra summer expedition we found and surveyed 2.666km of new cave passage. Very few leads were explored to completion, and we in fact finish the expedition with far more opportunities for exploration than we started with. One issue however is that the regions in which the cave is being actively explored are ever more disparate. All together we are looking forward to an extremely busy expedition in 2013 when we return.
The nature of the exploration, with all new cave passage found at depths greater than 500 m on multi-day camping trips represents the very highest level of achievement possible by a university caving club.
2012 Findings & report
We presented some of our findings at Hidden Earth 2012, the slides are available as PDF (39MB), the original Libreoffice ODP (88MB) and online via Scribd or Speaker Deck. 216 Slides, and rather confusing without the description, but better than nothing!
Survey
Extended Elevation: PDF (316K) Inkscape SVG (2.8M)
Plan: PDF (372K) Inkscape SVG (4.1M)
Surveys
Extended Elevation Survey (Slovene) Plan still in preparation, finished end Apr 2013
Further resources
Facebook Event (Sledi Vetra 2012) - Contacts + discussion
Migovec Microblog (actively updated between 2011-2013)
News and Updates
2012 Survey:
2010 Survey with Leads and Water superimposed - (PDF, 550KB)
Colour 2011 Vrtnarija Survey [EN] (600K PDF) — Colour 2011 Vrtnarija Survey [SLO] (588K PDF)
Colour 2011 Vrtnarija Survey [EN] (600K PDF) — Colour 2011 Vrtnarija Survey [SLO] (588K PDF)
Written Reports (Pre-2012)
2012-03-Slovenia-Caving-ICCC-Explo-Soc-Talk - Slides by Jarvist Frost summarising last three years exploration.
Izgubljeni Raj 2011 Interim Report
Vodna Sled 2010 Interim Report [18 page PDF]
Brezzvezdna Noc 2009 GPF Report [4 page PDF] |
Votla Gora 2008 Interim Report
Background Info
Location
Tolmin is on the edge of the Julian Alps in Western Slovenia. There is a train station at Most na Soci, and buses come up both from Nova Gorica (Gorizia on the Italian side) and Ljublijana. Cheapest flights are generally to Trieste with Ryanair, but also check out Venice and Easyjet to Ljublijana.
Tolminski Migovec can be seen all the way from the Most na Soci lake, and is most easily accessed by driving up to Tolminske Ravne (912m) which has a fully Tarmac'd road built for the hydro electric facility. The walking track then takes you up to 1500m through switchbacks in the forest (very sticky when it's hot in the valley) to Planina Kal (aka. The Shepherd's Huts). From here take the middle path that heads straight up (via switchbacks) towards Mig before heading north along the edge of the plateau, before the final set of switchbacks and scree to gain the Gateway.
Sponsorship and Thanks
Ghar Parau Foundation - Expedition equipment fund (rope!).
Starless River - Expedition equipment & advice.
Imperial College Trust and Imperial College Union - Tour funding (transport)
Below is a short interview between Jarv, Clare and Oli and Imperial College regarding Migovec, future aims for the expedition and a small plug for caving in general.