Took off valve cover & lots of gunk!

Hi folks!

Just went to replace my old cork valve cover on 1982 VW rabbit convertible, and the oil passages are full of nasty gunk as you can see in the pictures below. 

I'm getting about 6 bar at startup and up to 10bar when revving, so it's not surprising that I have some blockage. If someone has a second to answer a few questions that I can't find in the Bentley I'd really appreciate it:

1. What are these supposed to look like? They don't seem to be "thru" passages but is there some kind of hole at the bottom of the little cup here?
2. Any advice on how to clean? Risk of damage if I go scraping away? (obviuosly will avoid making shavings)
3. Everything but the cams is covered in a layer of black soot under the cover- any way to get rid of this without breaking the engine down? Some kind of oil additive + several changes?

Thanks so much in advance!

UPDATE: Wow there was so much gunk that I didn't realize that these are actually the head gasket bolts. My questions stand though, if anyone has advice on this amount of stuff & whether or not it's manageable I would appreciate it! General advice on how to get oil pressure down also greatly appreciated. Thank you!

 

Looks normal for an old engine and I would leave it how it is. Trying to clean it with the head on the car will end up with all the dirt going where it shouldn't.

To clean it properly wait for the head gasket to blow or valve steam seals to fail and when the heads off the car and with an engine specialist they can wash it in there big parts washer.

The only bit you need to clean is the metal gauze on the rocker cover, turn it upside down, block the outlet and leave some Gunk de-greaser overnight then clean it out with warm water.

Great, thank you so much! Good advice, better to not disturb it. Cover is soaking now.

It's good to hear but was hoping this was the easy fix to the high oil pressure- I guess we'll see what the pump looks like when I pull the pan off tomorrow. Cheers.

What oil are you using?

20W50, perhaps a bit too thick for 65°F temps outside? It'll never get below 40°F here so I figured it was safe

It might be to thick, in the UK I use 10w40 semi synthetic oil.

You should be able to purchase an engine flush, which you either replace the oil with for a short run, or add to the oil before you do an oil change and run briefly.