Anne-A-Kanada

[Pedro]

We covered a fair bit of territory during our recent trip to the NE Ridge of Anne. One to the many great things about the Mt Anne area is that it is just full of amazing features that would be a destination in their own right, even if they weren't surround by some of the best scenery in Tasmania. I haven't been to any where near all the interesting places and there are many I haven't seen enough of. I'd love to see a good sunrise from Lake Timk, but I suspect the walk is pretty challenging, judging by the first two hours of it. It looks to me as if there is a stunning waterfall further up the Timk valley - you get a glimpse of it from out near Lot's Wife - but I suspect that there is a world of pain involved in getting close and maybe no view of it anyway.

Anyway, this trip, one of the things we took a closer look at was Anne-A-Kananda. I've looked into this sink hole on many occasions and even joined an early caving trip (1969) that intended to go into it (but didn't, for reasons I can't remember), but this trip was the first time that I followed the cavers track down into the mouth of the hole. It doesn't go far before a rope would be necessary, but, boy, what a view.

I've read cavers accounts of their trips into the cave system below the sinkhole, but they seem to have vanished off the net.

So, here are a few pics of what has been described as the deepest hole in Australia:

Anne-A-Kananda from the NE Ridge

Sorry about the quality of the panorama, but I was working with what I had to give an overview of this huge hole. In the background is the well named Sodom and Gommorrah. I ended up explaining the whole story about those two towns, Lot and his unfortunate wife to my party - the benefits of a Catholic education!!!

From the Ridge, you can see the steep gully used to enter the hole. Its in the middle of the picture. You can get about half way down the picture before freefall is involved if you don't have a rope.

The descent gully.

I'm not about to recommend that anyone enter this gully. It could be very slippery if wet (undoubtedly its normal state) and a fall would be a one way trip. We did follow the track in.

The view up was a little threatening:

Looking up

[ollster]

Gee, that doesn't make me desire to head up the NE ridge at all... super pics.

[Pedro]

The view further down is intimidating:

You can see the cave mouth, but, looking almost straight down into it, it doesn't look to enticing.

The key to getting down there is this:

Looks a bit old and corroded for my taste. Anyone know when it was last used? Anyway, I'm not about to test it.

[Julafreak]

Nice! I wonder what it would look like down there. Reminds me of that book 'Journey to the centre of the earth' I used to read when I was younger..

[ILUVSWTAS]

Martin has a great pic of me sitting on the edge of that cave, i'll see if i can dig it up after work..... I featured anneA in the where am I game recently thought it might stump people, but it seems quite a few people know about it!

EDIT-> Ok here are the pics!!
See the one of me sitting on the edge for scale!!!

Attachments

Me on the edge of Anne A

View from where I was sitting

The entrance

[Nick S]

awesome pics! Love to visit it someday

[scrub master]

So, here are a few pics of what has been described as the deepest hole in Australia:

A bit of caving history/trivia for those interested. This is actually only the third deepest hole in the country these days. Anna-a-Kananda did hold the crown for a number of years in the 80's at -373m but was knocked off it's perch in the mid 90's with the discovery of Niggly cave in the Junee Florentine at -375m. Poor old Anne-a was further relegated about three years ago when Tachycardia cave, also in the Junee was pushed to -375.5m

A bit more interesting trivia, Anne-a-Kananda has the 4th biggest cave pitch (abseil), the 118m Heartbeat pitch. Number three at 128m is also on the NE ridge of Mt Anne in Kellar Cellar. Number 1 & 2 dwarf these two by camparison - The Bermuda Triangle pitch in Tachycardia comes in at 170m and Niggly trumps them all with the Black Super Giant at a whopping 190m.

While these numbers are impresive, I think they're pretty academic to us mere mortals who will do little more than look in awe over the edge, although I can always dream....

I was planning to put up a map of Anne-a-Kananda to show what a labyrinth it was underground, but I can't find my copy of it. Will have another ferret around the filing cabinet and see if I can dig it out

In the meantime, here is a picture from the bowels of Tachycardia on one of the early exploration trips - looks like fun doesn't it

tachy.jpg (82.73 KiB) Viewed 17518 times

[Pedro]

Ah - fascinating. The first trip I did into the area was lead by Alan Kellar. I presume that Kellar's Cellar is named after him. There was a huge search in the area not long afterwards when a caver got mislaid on the way back from up there. He never was found to my knowledge. I think that the Bombadier track might have been put in at that time and still forms the basis for the track on the plains.

I'm pretty sure that I saw that map of Anne-A-Kananda on the net at some point, but I can't find it anymore. Meanwhile, even it is no longer the deepest hole, it certainly has an impressive entrance - hard to miss.

[stepbystep]

Fascinating stuff, thanks scrubmaster.
Would love to see that map.

[MJD]

Very interesting details about the caves.

190m abseil - at least it will be dark so you can't actually see how far that is .

[MichaelP]

Just been up to NE Ridge this week and man was Anne-a AMAZING!!!
Here is another shot.

Anne-A-Kanada

[Poosnapper]

old Anne-a-Kananda map

Tachycardia map

A rather belated post on this thread - sorry.
scrub master did his homework regarding cave depths, although Niggly Cave is currently being resurveyed and looks like coming in around the 380+ m deep mark, so will reclaim first place most likely.
Copy of old AAK map should be attached (if I did it properly). This map is now out of date, as a new route to the 'Junkyard' (deepest point) was found ten years ago. I've not been down AAK, but I have bottomed Niggly and was part of the exploration team for Tachycardia - that's my mate Gavin Brett in the photo scrub master posted, about to descend the 16 m pitch 'On the Rope Again'. Vertical section map of Tachy also attached for those interested.
Pedro's suspicion about Kellars Cellar is also correct.

[north-north-west]

*drool*

Anyone wanna do a caving expedition? Have a couple of mates due in the state from Vic for an SRT course next month, they'd be up for it . . .

[iandsmith]

Nah, doesn't look like "fun" to me but fascinating stuff nonetheless; thanks for sharing.

[daznkez]

Nice shots Pedro
Always awesome to walk in limestone/ dolomite country
BUt can be hard to find water.. on the surface
That last cave map for Tachycardia is in Junee Florentine, note the JF prefix
Speak to Southern Tasmanian Caverneers (STC) for further info

DnK