Scialet du Lièvre Blanc

Le Scialet du Lièvre Blanc opens with a shaft in two sections at the edge of a track, a discreet sign “Scialet” indicating the mortal danger of skiing over the snowdrift that hides it. The first part, whose mouth is very vast, is such that the descent takes place in the open air. The courageous caver sets foot, after a well-marked pendulum on the left, on a ledge 10 metres from the top, a ledge that must be crossed to reach a shaft 20 metres deep that opens literally beneath the line of limestone opposite.

In winter, the configuration is quite different and justifies the pendulum; in particular, one is then on a snow cone that leads more or less directly to the continuation. One must not descend the continuation completely, but pull to the right as soon as one has touched the ground or the snow, to approach an old handline in place (which it is strongly advised to back up), which again commands a shaft of 12 metres. Here too, snow conditions can lead to quite varied configurations.

Once this shaft is descended, the blessed caver will pass through the “lucarne des Bannis” which leads to a series of small shafts, with a slightly narrow passage in the middle of the descent that guards the “puits des Réfutés”, whose configuration is identical. He then arrives at a place where a notable widening faces him. Setting off in that direction, which requires downclimbing a small step, he will quickly encounter vertical blades as he progresses, then have to stoop to finally get stuck in a meander cleared in 1993, but which defeated the perseverance of the first explorers. He must then turn back and, climbing the small step, he will find facing him a lucarne commanding the “boyau des Tourments”, the object of a fierce digging whose scars are clearly visible. The end of the crawl is very straight and pinches a little at times, for it was entirely dug by human hand. A small widening, where one can finally fill one’s lungs, gives on the right onto the “ressaut de la Délivrance”, which is now about two metres high.

This step descended, a meander opens opposite, also cleared, 5 to 6 metres long, which gives, this time, onto a wide and deep meander. A fine chamber, damp in rainy weather as is the rest of the cave, gives, once again, onto a narrow meander widened by our careful and nonetheless constant efforts. The “puits Tony Glandyl” begins in the fault, but quickly reaches big stuff: this shaft of 25 metres is in two parts, the first of 22 metres arrives at a ledge (spit opposite on the nearest wall) which, 3 metres lower, gives access to a shower from which it is advisable to escape quickly.

Arrived there, the still valiant caver finds a piece of meander high but thin, which had to be mined again to pass. Once more, the shaft head starts in a more or less dodgy way in the bottom of the meander to open onto heavy stuff, the “puits Scatogène”, 40 metres deep. The descent of this shaft is superb, and arrives at a break that commands another shaft, the “puits Racine” (“I shudder when I see – The deep abysses that open before me.”, Esther – 1689 –, act III, scene 1) of 25 metres, at the bottom of which opens on the left, this time in a very conventional manner, a large and wide shaft, the “puits du Mildiou”, and its 40 metres. A quick downclimb on the right makes us understand that the continuation is not that way. The descent of the puits du Mildiou, and its rigging to be out of flood, forces contortions over the last 10 metres.

At the bottom a meander of about a dozen metres sets off, interspersed with a small step. It becomes wide and one must use a handline mid-meander to arrive at a ledge that gives onto an enormous shaft, the P80 + P70 of the “Tintins”. At the bottom of this shaft, a narrowed passage gives onto a shaft of 10 metres at the bottom of which an active shaft of 25 metres (without continuation) and a fossil shaft of 20 metres, which must be descended, open. At the bottom of that one, decidedly it never stops, a shaft of 50 metres opens. The descent is quite broken up, and the arrival is in the long-awaited collector!

The upstream sumps immediately at the bottom of the shaft, one might imagine the adventure over. Nevertheless, the joyful but nonetheless attentive caver will have noted on the right on the way down, about twenty metres from the bottom, a lucarne. The passage being delicate, one must climb back to about fifteen metres from the top of the puits des Tintins to, on the right, see the start of a slightly clayey and unwelcoming crawl, which, after 15 metres, opens onto a ledge that commands a shaft of an enormous volume, which is descended in two pitches and totals 60 metres, the “puits des Connasses”.

A meander of good width opens and quickly gives into a crumbling chamber, for we are now in the Hauterivian. The continuation is without surprise: one follows for more than 250 metres a thoroughly crappy fossil (it is a conglomerate of rock and earth), interspersed with several steps to rig, including the “puits du Polak”, and one descends willy-nilly nearly 100 metres of elevation to arrive above the shaft of the “Pine d’Huître”, named thus because at its top a superb oyster was attached by about nothing, and which was detached during an unfortunate stone fall. The descent of the shaft leads to an active stream that plunges into a meander followed for more than 150 metres to arrive at an unwelcoming terminal sump.

The explorer is happy to touch the bottom, for he can travel about 130 metres horizontally down the active stream, to find himself blocked at a sump. He bypasses it, but after a little crawling, a small chamber indicates the end of this part, for two sumps close it off. The upstream sumps immediately at the bottom of the shaft.

He will find spits where he expects them, and will have to bring slings for a few natural anchors in the ceiling, those in place dating still from the original exploration. By rigging on the right in the last metre of the meander the shaft in the widening that follows it, one arrives after a few metres at the top of the “puits Kévina”, of a small ten metres. The “puits Tony Glandyl” is rigged on the left at the start, then on the right once out into the void. The P80 + P70 of the “Tintins” is rigged in two sections: a pull of 50 metres, the longest of the entire pit, followed by two times 15 metres.

The continuation is on the left, in an interstrate where a bat skeleton was found during the first visit, but which a friendly but inattentive boot destroyed.

Source: Christian Hubert, Frédéric Pétrot and Pascal Guillermier, “Scialet du Lièvre Blanc”, Scialet: bulletin du CDS de l'Isère, Grenoble, Comité départemental de spéléologie de l'Isère, no. 40, 2011, p. 5-13: https://cds38.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/SCIALET_40.pdf