The Crown of Polish Holes - Marie Agnes

And we are supposed to go in there! – I asked in disbelief looking at the hole where even a fat badger would get stuck. Of course. How else could we find out if we keep our sanity where Fritzl’s family is, or if there is still hope for us?

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Dressed in dry suits, we carried the bottles first, squeezing on our knees through the obscenely narrow passage. Further on, it was looser, and I, due to my not very impressive height, could even stretch out comfortably.

We stood over a small opening filled with clear water. In the turquoise light of the torches, we could see wooden spreader beams and a ladder leading down. We looked at it with some doubt, while exchanging meaningful glances and seriously considering changing our hobby to stamp collecting, wicker basket weaving or ikebana tuning. However, since we had already managed to get here, bring our equipment and dress up in all this smelly junk, it would be a pity to stop at arranging a surface picnic in an old mine.

We didn’t come here for pleasure! – ordered Sebastian. Time to get in the water!

When diving in Marie Agnes, we opted for minimalism. We did away with all unnecessary pieces of equipment, such as fins. I decided to go a step further, on the assumption that what you can’t see isn’t scary, and do the dive without a mask.

We explore the corridors, moving like astronauts in a state of weightlessness. Flippers would have been a redundant feature, when all you have to do is drag yourself with one finger to explore all the corridors comfortably and without spoiling your visibility. The first level, unlike the lower one, turned out to be quite spacious and easy to navigate. With nostalgia in my soul, worthy of any ethnologist, I looked at the turnstile for hauling out the excavated material, at the well-preserved wood, bright in the light of torches.

Then, apparently, one of us got something wrong under the dome, because he decided that enough of these carefree swings on the spacious first level and it was time to see the far less spacious and reminiscent of the guts of a hungry raccoon corridors on the second level. This is where the fun began…

It went one way, it will go the other! – I thought phlegmatically looking at the narrow passage.

I had faced it before, from the other side, when, without much thought, I rushed into a tight hole right behind Sebastian. I got stuck for a moment somewhere in the middle, where visibility had already dropped to zero after the first participant passed. I had the perfect opportunity to think about my diet and evening snacking. After a while, with a sigh, I moved forward like a caterpillar that had spotted a juicy leaf of its dreams and swam to the other side.

Marie Agnes, despite two levels, is relatively small and in just 20 minutes we explored practically all the nooks and crannies. Eventually, our adventures came to an end and the instructor, who was accompanied by a devil and a demon on the dive, decided to exorcise us from the hole to the surface.

Some of you will probably ask what this Marie Agnes is and why I write so warmly about her. Well, Marie Agnes is an exceptionally pretty and filigree silver mine that we don’t know much about, located in Bystrzyca Górna, a town whose history dates back to the 14th century. Under its beautiful name Marie Agnes it only appears in mining records from 1904, which is all the more mysterious as the mine dates back to the 16th century when intensive mining work began in the Bystrzyca area.

To dive Marie Agnes is to dive into a distant history of several hundred years, a turbulent one, full of wars destroying the created order and intense development in peacetime. We know from mining maps that in 1924 the mine is recognised and described as a disused workings. We will probably never find out who and how many people worked there or what precious treasures were created from the silver extracted at Marysia. The blank spots in the history of this place let us only guess at the fate of people connected with a small mine in Bystrzyca Górna.

The town is exceptionally pretty and if you don’t like diving or have a free moment, it is worth taking a walk here. A 19th century palace complex and a beautiful park, as well as a church, rebuilt many times and modestly furnished, dating back to the 17th century, introduce a bit of a fairytale, haunted atmosphere of this place. There is no shortage of ghosts in Lower Silesia, and the Owl Mountains stimulate the imagination of explorers and adventurers from all over Poland.

Thebottom in the black hole was reached by the most blackmetal diving band consisting of:
Sebastian Dobrowolski and his instructor’s gaze full of disbelief, and the demon and the devil, namely Maciej “Demon” Kolasinski and Daria Boruta.

The project is being developed with the support and cooperation of the Speleodiving Cave Diving Academy.

Photos: Maciej Kolasinski