THE FAMOUS RESSEL CAVE

THE FAMOUS RESSEL CAVE

Text and photos Kurt Storms

EMERGENCE DU RESSEL IS A FAMOUS CAVE IN FRANCE’S SOUTHERN DEPARTMENT LOT. ITS FURTHEST REACHES HAVE ALREADY BEEN EXPLORED BY MANY FAMOUS DIVERS. BUT YOU DON'T HAVE TO DESCEND 4 KM DEEP INTO THE PIT TO APPRECIATE ITS MAGIC.

LOCATION: LOT REGION IN FRANCE

Finally!!! We can go visit Lot again. This time for a week of training and then another week of diving vacation with my wife. I have some students lined up for their Intro-To-Cave Diver course. Over the next few days, they’ll be busy with skills and dry practice. They’ve already completed the theoretical training in Belgium, which will allow us to get the most out of our dives. Apart from the students, a few other certified divers will join us later to dive together towards the end of the trip, hoping to shoot some nice photos. Conditions in all the cave systems are exceptional, with visibility reaching over 20 m.

WHY LOT?

This region of France is famous, as most European divers complete their courses here, so they don't have to travel to Mexico or Florida. One of the most famous caves around here is Ressel. It is located in the village of Marcilhac-sur-Célé, at the heart of Lot. Most pictures available online are taken in that cave, portraying its dramatic huge blocks of white rock, flat structures and shafts. The facilities around the cave are nice, with plenty of parking space and a toilet in a separate building, which has been awaited for years. From the parking lot you need to walk some 100 meters, which brings you to the entrance on the Celé river. This is where we can prepare all our equipment for the dive.

HISTORY

Ressel was first dived in 1968 by 2 divers from the Auvergnat speleo club. Martin and Debras dived a distance of 150 meters from the entrance and it would take until 1973 for the mainline to reach 300 meters, with a maximum depth of 30 meters. In 1975, Fantoli and Touloumdoian reached Pit 4 and descended to a depth of 45 meters. Further exploration would continue over the years, especially by Jochem Hasemayer in the early 1980s. This is the time when he planted his knife in the rock and attached a line to it, some 1100 meters into the system. This knife remains there until present day.

On 12 August 1990, Olivier Isler was the first to cross siphon 1, with a total dive time of 10 hours and 35 minutes.

Siphon 1 terminates at Lac Isler and from here you can continue to the next siphons. Ressel consists of 5 siphons, with siphon 1 being the longest (1850 meters) and the deepest (-83 meters). The cave’s deep section begins at siphon 4 and can only be dived with trimix.

In the years to come, additional siphons are explored by gentlemen such as Rick Stanton, Martin Farr, Mallison. Explorers reached the end of siphon 5 in 1999, closing the mainline with a total length of 4415 meters.

SPECTACULAR VIEWS IN THE FIRST SECTION

To be honest, the experience is impressive, with spectacular visibility all around. More than 10 meters of visibility, up from about 5 cm at the Celé river, is quite the change. As soon as you get to the entrance, the water clears up like snow in the sun. The first thought to cross my mind was “How on earth did they find this cave?”. With the visibility you can expect in the river, how can you spot quite a tiny hole that is 6 meters below the surface. Some quick inquiries with the locals revealed that when the cave fills up, you can see a geyser in the river! Another impressive detail.

There is a line that runs from the entrance point all the way into the cave, connecting to the mainline, allowing you to forget your primary reel here. Finding the entrance, which is located at 6 meters, is really easy. It opens up into a huge tunnel, with white giant rocks, again – most impressive.

Our first training dives only took us to the T (180 meters), where we practiced mandatory skills to ensure that the comfort zone later on would be more extensive. This is also a very nice section of the cave, especially because of the large blocks to be seen here. You can expect to see some marvelous and extraordinary phenomena here, namely 3 blocks of white limestone with large black spots that cannot be seen anywhere else. It is wonderful to be able to admire nature like this.

You can expect to see some marvelous and extraordinary phenomena here, namely 3 blocks of white limestone with large black spots that cannot be seen anywhere else. It is wonderful to be able to admire nature like this.

After a week of intensive diving, training and above all lots of fun, I can certify my student divers and they make a few more supervised dives in Ressel.

I enjoyed the training and made friends with some of the students.

NOW THAT THE TRAINING IS DONE, IT IS TIME TO MAKE OUR PRE-PLANNED PHOTO DIVE

This team for this dive will consist of me, my wife Caroline, Elfi and Bart. We’ll all be using DPVs to move around, which will allow us to reach the site of our photoshoot in less than 15 min. We’re headed for the well-known pit 4, some 400 meters from the exit.

We’re are diving closed circuit to get the longest possible bottom time and I will be diving dive my beloved Divesoft Liberty SM CCR.

For the photo session, Olivier Bertieaux gave me 2 demo lights to test and use. These will be strategically placed or held by a fellow diver during the photo session.

Once we arrive at the spot, we attach DPVs to the line and Bart and I move into the pit to place a lamp there, so that we can create an effect along the bottom.

Once the divers hoover in place, I start shooting according to the plan that was agreed before we started the dive. This is the first time that I will not be using strobes and only work with artificial light from lamps, which required some adjustment at the beginning. But let me tell you – wow, the results are great. You need a lot of lumens and I’m glad I can use lights with 60,000 and 30,000 lumens. Dissipated light still makes the photos more beautiful and natural.

Once we have already accumulated some bottom time, we decide it's time to turn back. We re-attach our DPVs and as soon as everyone is ready, we head back until we arrive at the gallery that is still some 10 meters under water. Here we’ll take another shoot, but with the DPVs, so we have some pictures of that as well.

After about 100 minutes of dive time, I signal that I have enough images and we calmly set off on our way out.

After surfacing, I’m teeming with enthusiasm about the lights we got. The difference compared to a flash is enormous. Over the past week, I took my camera out a few times to take pictures of my students. This was done with strobes and the results were much different. My first words to Caroline are “I need to get such a powerful lamp, but the price tag is a bit disappointing”. But I am not the only one who is happy. All the faces I see on the shore are happy, including my students who have pushed their comfort zone, who have come to know the beauty of the caves. I can also see pride in the path they chose to take. How wonderful it is to be able to convey your passion as an instructor.

If any of you would want to dive Ressel, let me assure you that the system is one of the most beautiful caves in Europe and is very easily accessible. Do not however enter it without some prior knowledge and the necessary training.

Location:

France, Emergence du Ressel

Divers:

Kurt Storms, Caroline Massie, Elfi Elsen, Bart Hermans