SLOVENIJA 1990-1993

INTRODUCTION

In August, 1990 Steve Greatorex, Andy (Mad Vet) Maloney, Stuart Weston and myself went to Slovenija. This was to be the start of a series of YSS expeditions/holidays to one of the most interesting and exciting Karst areas in Europe. Indeed, the word 'Karst' originated from these parts.

Most Slovenes speak German and a lot speak English to some degree, so communication is not usually a problem.

Steve had been many times over the previous 20 years or so and had made contact with a local Geology professor who promised him several unexplored shafts on his next visit.

POSITION

Slovenija, formerly the northern-most state of Yugoslavia, declared independence in 1991 and is now a totally independent republic recognized by most other countries. It nestles between Italy, Austria, Hungary and Croatia (Yugoslavia) and is easily accessible from either of the former countries.

DESCRIPTION

Slovenija is a very beautiful, largely forested region, in the middle of a vast limestone area. There are mountains and meadows, forests and lakes, enormous caves and olde-worlde villages. The depth of the limestone (circa 1990) is about 6Km, so the area has obvious potential!

We were to visit the Typical Karst area near Postojna, to the west of Ljubljana. The land is mostly forested shakeholes and do-lines, so cave location is made extremely difficult. Based in the middle of the Planinsko Polje at Laze, we were ideally sited to explore some of the best caves.

THE WALKS

One of the best walks in the area is undoubtedly the "Jama Traverse", a circular walk through the forest near Laze. This walk, in its entirety, will take the best part of a day to complete. It starts just beyond the "Laze" sign as you leave the village in the direction of Logatec. Route-finding is easy as the route is marked by a series of red triangles on trees and rocks. Omega signs mark the points where caves can be found and all the caves are numbered to make identification easy.

Leaving the main dirt road, the scenery is, to say the least, dramatic. Flowers and deer and other fauna were everywhere. Bears and snakes also live here, but we didn't see any of these! In fact, the bears are said to be more afraid of humans than vice-versa.

Walking along the track, the trees cleared. An enormous shakehole ended at a limestone cliff with the biggest cave entrance I've ever seen - Vranja Jama (Wind Cave). The start of the descent into the shakehole is a steep muddy slope which gives way to boulders going into the cavern. The walk takes you on through the forest, passing many other cave entrances, until reaching the main Logatec-Laze road.

Another walk, around the lower half of the Planinsko Polje, is equally as good. We walked along the road to Planina - a very quaint little village with more than its fair share of churches (no less than 3 of them) - with fantastic views of Zagora and Planinska Gora, a large tree-covered mountain.

We continued through Planina towards the tower at the edge of the forest which marks the entrance to Planinska Jama. The entrance is at the foot of a tall limestone cliff. The water level was surprisingly low here. We had a brief wander inside as far as the gate and then came out.

Setting off back towards Planina, crossing the valley and continuing along the far side of the polje, we soon came to the ruin of a castle. We stopped here at the river Unica for a rest. The sun was scorching and the water looked very welcoming but was icy cold! The depth marker by the road bridge caused some concern - the top mark was about 3' above the road level! Apparently, in early spring, the river floods to an amazing extent, filling half of the polje.

We continued along a track which looked to be going towards Laze. Unfortunately, we shortly found ourselves on the wrong side of the River Unica so we had no choice but to follow it and see where it took us. Heading into the forest, the water level suddenly dropped dramatically. Looking down, several interesting looking sinks were located but, as we weren't sure how far we would have to walk back to Laze, we didn't take too close a look.

THE CAVES

Krizna Jama

Krizna Jama is huge! Basically, it consists of a main river passage with 22 lakes ending at Kristalna Gora (Crystal Mountain).

At the far side of the first lake, is Medvedji Rov (Bear Passage), which has quite a collection of fossils of the extinct cave bear. Apparently they all died of starvation during hibernation.

We paddled along the gallery in inflatable dinghies, stopping only to cross the calcite dams between the lakes. Many large formations were passed including all the usual stuff - columns, curtains and flowstone. At Kalvarija, the mid point, we were faced with a row of 20' high columns across the entire width of the passage - what a sight. From here, a scramble up some boulders led into the roof above Kalvarija where an amazing display of flowstone and straws lay before us.

Further upstream on the right is Matjazev Rov, a passage with magnificent formations, but the best part of the cave is, by far, Kristalna Gora - at the end of the main passage - with it's crystal-embedded stal.

Planinska Jama

This cave is close to the village of Planina, at the end of the Planinsko Polje. The entrance is about 100m high and is located close to an imposing round watch-tower on the River Pivka (pronounced 'Puke-a'!)

A short way inside the cave is an iron gate which must be scaled before further exploration can take place! Further in, the way splits into two with the Pivka taking the right hand branch and the Rak coming in from the left. After only a few metres along the Rak, the path ends at a series of chambers reached by a dodgy traverse wire. At the far end of these chambers, the Rak flows upstream through 12 x 18m high passages to an incredibly clear shrimp-infested sump.

We did not explore the Pivka branch.

Najdena Jama

Najdena lies about 300m north of Vranja Jama and consists of a complex of phreatic tubes, perched above the water table, extending for several Kilometres beneath the forest to the north of Laze. It doesn't boast any of the formations or lakes found in other Slovene caves, but never the less is very interesting in its own right.

During the extremely dry weather of 1993, an exploratory trip was made to the Sumeca Dvorana in the north-eastern extremities of the system. It had been reported that the passages beyond the 'final' sump had only been passed by divers on a couple of occasions and were not fully explored. Even in this period of low water, there was still no airspace so a visit was made to the southern part of the cave, a series of canyon-like passages lying beneath Vranja Jama. On the way out of Sumeca, a series of high-level fossil passages was pushed to several inlets requiring the use of climbing aids. Fred also squeezed his way into the 'Labirint' and explored a series of normally submerged passages.

In Konglomeratna Dvorana a draught was noticed, along with a fair amount of water percolating through the roof. This is an unusual feature in Najdena and suggests a close proximity to the surface, possibly providing an alternative entrance.

The original entrance appears to be Jama Na Meji, an 85m deep shaft to the east of Vranja Jama, which may possibly provide access to the river system beneath Najdena which drains the Planinsko Polje.

Zelske Jama

Located in the Rakov Scocjan Natural Park, Zelske Jama is a fine trip along a river. The entrance is beneath a natural bridge, some 30m or so high. The cave contains some fine formations and has a second entrance in the side of an enormous shakehole in the forest.

In 1993, an exploratory trip was made to Mrzli Rov. From the beaching point, a steep slope led into a small passage, obviously little visited. A series of crawls, traverses and scrambles headed for about 200m south into a chamber which, reportedly, normally contained a pool. On this occasion, however, the floor consisted entirely of cracked mud. A small opening in the left hand wall led into another chamber with all ways on choked with mud. This area is normally flooded.

Mackovica Jama

The entrance choke led into Velika Dvorana - more of a huge passage than a chamber. Severozahodni Rov is the only significant side passage and is located behind a house-sized boulder. A mud traverse and bridge led to walking passage, ending at the top of a climb, descending to a platform above another drop. A difficult climb up flowstone to the left proved to be the way on. The passage continued, lowering to a descending tube which led to another difficult climb down into a mud-floored chamber, with a 'doorway' into a smaller chamber. At the far side of this was a mud-lined double shaft, normally a sump! Descent was made down a 5m pitch into knee-deep mud! The sump, now, was merely a small pool. A descending narrow rift appeared to be the way on, initially constricted, then continuing down to the left. Continuation was too tight and there was no draught here. The chamber at the top of the rift was named Sifon Dvorana.

On the way out, a definite draught was felt in Blatni Rov - the passage leading to the sump. When this was reported to France later, he claimed that there hadn't been a draught reported here before and that this could indicate a link between Mackovica and Logarcek Jama - with a prospect of a 3Km through trip!

Brezno Pri Rjavem Kamnu

This was our first good find of 1990, as with all the following caves, in the forest to the north of Laze. A small hole at the bottom of a small rock face didn't look too exciting - until stones were heard to fall a long way down!

The entrance is a rift which made bolting difficult to say the least. Luckily, it soon opened out into quite a nice little shaft interrupted at about -11m by a rock bridge. The shaft continued to about -23m, where a balcony marked the start of the shaft proper, opening out into large proportions. The bottom of the shaft was reached at -47m, the floor being about 10m diameter.

A narrow slot to one side continued into a small chamber, leading through a very small hole into another small chamber. A calcited slot at the bottom corner issued a draught, but was too small to pass.

Brezno Pri Kalicu

Once again, located in the forest near Laze, 'The bottomless pit near the Pond' proved to be a single 30m pitch! Across the walls near the bottom of the shaft were dozens of dead spiders, covered in a white fungus and the floor was covered with (live) Firebellied Salamanders.

Matizijevo Brezno

This was our big find of 1990. We had been told that the only previous exploration was in 1910, when a little boy had been tied to a rope and dangled 10m down, reporting that it appeared to go a lot further! People had thrown stones down the hole and it was estimated to be about 30m deep. We lowered about 38m of ladder down the shaft and sent Andy Maloney down. A short while later he emerged, out of breath, reporting that he had reached the end of the ladder and that the floor of the shaft was nowhere in sight!

Hearing this, France became really excited and wrote a note which, we were assured, would get us all the ropes and ladders in Slovenija (or at least as much as we needed)!

Once armed with this abundance of tackle, Steve Greatorex set off to rig it for SRT. The rock was very crumbly, so re-belays were used at every available point. About 25m down was a 45 deg. sloping ledge, piled high with stones that people had thrown down over the years! The slope opened out into an immense chamber about 20m across, the floor of which was nowhere to be seen! At -60m, a rock bridge cut a corner off the shaft dividing it into two unequal shafts. A further 20m down the larger of the shafts, the floor was reached, sloping down to a short pitch. The cave choked at -100m.

Robertova Jama

Of the four entrances visited on the Logaska Planota in 1993, this was the only one to receive a name (probably the only one that anyone wanted to admit to having discovered!) One of three uninspiringly small shafts, the deepest being about 8m deep, all were choked with a combination of rocks, bones, wood & leaves.

Nearby, however, was a more interesting shaft in the side of a large doline. After a couple of hours of 'gardening' at the top, the rift was rigged and Fred set off down. There were a couple of high level inlets, but any continuation was well and truly out of the question. Choking at about -12m, the cave remains un-named.

OTHER CAVES VISITED

These are just a small selection of the caves visited on the three trips covered by this article. Of the many other caves visited, Predjama and Logaska Jama offer two of the best trips available. Postojnska Jama, a show cave at Postojna, offers a very grandiose introductory trip into the underground world for the caver and non-caver alike. It is quite expensive, but a caving trip on a TRAIN is definitely 'different'!

TEAM MEMBERS

Steve Greatorex, Kev Sheard, Andy Maloney, Stuart Weston, Phil Higginson, Fred Weekes, Robert Weekes.

ACCOMMODATION/INFORMATION

Franc Facija Speleo-Camp Laze 6B 61370 Logatec SLOVENIJA

REFERENCES

Caves & Caving - issue 53, pp 13-14

Yorkshire Subterranean Society Newsletter 247 (Sept 1990) pp 17-19

Yorkshire Subterranean Society Newsletter 248 (Oct 1990) pp 10-12

Yorkshire Subterranean Society Newsletter 249 (Nov 1990) pp 18-25

Yorkshire Subterranean Society Newsletter 275 (June 1993) pp 7-9

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

France Sustersic for providing us with details and locations of the new caves visited.

Franc Facija for providing us with accommodation on each of our visits to Laze.

Boris Marolt, our cave guide to Krizna Jama and Predjama.

This article has been compiled from a series of articles written jointly by Steve Greatorex, Andy Maloney, Stuart Weston and myself.

KEV SHEARD

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