20th December 2018 - The forgetfulness spell

My excuse is that it's the end of term, but I don't think we've ever forgotten as much on a single trip before.

Once again it was wet and as we're beginning to run out of wet weather options, I decided I'd like to go on a trip to practice taking photos on pitches. The most convenient place I could think of and a place I always enjoy going, Bull Pot of the Witches beckoned.

While changing Dick realised that he'd forgotten his helmet.  Fortunately though he had with him a prototype, kevlar reinforced, caving flat cap. Though the stiffened brim serves as a handy place on which to mount a candle, Dick also had a new headtorch he wanted to test and so eschewed the more traditional form of illumination.

After inspecting the fantastic new interpretation board at Bull Pot Farm, we took the short stroll to the pot's style and carefully traversed around and down to the entrance tunnel.

Free climbing the pitch saw us swiftly at the bottom of the open pot and heading down to the continuation pitches. Dick descended,  positioned flashes and partly reascended while I placed another flash and prepared to take a few shots. With the shot perfectly composed I pressed the shutter.  The flashes fired and for a split second the finest caving photo I've ever taken was displayed on the camera's screen. I had only just started to revel in its artistic perfection however, when it was replaced by a stark black and white message, "No memory card".

Accepting it was just one of those days and with the upside that all the pitches had been beautifully rigged by members of the CDG, we set off for an explore. The streamway was no place to be, so we visited the long gallery and had a bit of a ratch around before returning up the main pitch. I love the fact that I struggle to work out just how this cave is all connected.

The Barbon Inn was doing a roaring trade, a group who I presume had been young farmers a number of years previously were having a great night out and we're fully dressed for the occasion. As always we were warmly welcomed, but did quickly head for the quieter room, next to the fire.

On leaving, the party in the main bar was in even fuller flow and I hate to think what the gentleman stood on one of the tables was about to do with the stuffed (taxidermy not sage and onion) pheasant he was brandishing.

Merry Christmas to one and all.

13th December 2018 - An unexpected journey

Dick beginning to rig in the biting wind

It's been wet so the plan was to rig Death's Head, a new cave for Tony and I, before negotiating the dug connection to the Lost John's master cave and then turn round once we saw what we presumed would be a raging torrent heading towards the sump.

For the second week in a row we found ourselves parked next to other cavers, it's definitely becoming a very popular sport!  We changed under clear skies and in a biting wind, before heavily laden with a 100m rope, set off across the moor in the trail of all the other cavers. 

Despite the crowds, we had Death's Head to ourselves and Dick was soon rigging from a post in the encircling fence.  We're not sure if the pin from a bolt, hammered into the top of the post signified a survey station, or a specially reinforced belay fence post, but it certainly seemed less rickety than the others. Fortunately it's just steep ground down to the belay tree below, rather than a vertical drop, so it wasn't going to be taking that much weight.

Down the rabbit hole...

Dick soon had a sling round the tree and set of down to the first rebelay.  Joining Tony at the tree I was glad to be out of the wind. Putting my gloves back on after taking photos had left me with sickening hot aches, though I was glad that blood was returning to my fingers again.

Meeting up with Tony again at the rebelay we both looked skyward as the wind rushing over the top of the pot emulated someone blowing over an enormous milk bottle, producing an eery, resonating howl.

As rebelay followed rebelay, I realised it had been a long time since we'd done a cave with 'big' pitches. I'd love to do this pot again in the light as I'm sure much of its glory was hidden in the shadows.  The howls of wind noise from above was now replaced with hollers of delight from Dick below as he dropped the final pitch and landed on the boulder slope floor of the main chamber.

While I could see the other two below me, my attention was grabbed by the huge jammed boulder that acts as the take off for the final pitch. Sometimes it's best not to think too much about these things.

The main chamber is an incredible place and the dug shaft at it's base an amazing piece of engineering,  completed in just 7 weeks. This must have been a much more comfortable place for the diggers after their travails in the link between Notts II and Lyle Caverns. A lone bat had decided it was a nice place to spend the winter too.

The clever mammals know how to avoid all the brexit twaddle

Tony soon had a rope down the scaffolded shaft and Dick swiftly followed.  In readiness for the squirminess I believed to be ahead I stopped at the bottom of the pitch to take off my SRT gear, the other's voices disappearing down the continuation crawl.  The crawls and short squeezes completed a handlined climb dropped us into a beautiful piece of streamway and suddenly we were there at a short, rigged pitch down into a gently running stream.

Tony on the dig pitch

Tony with his gear still on was soon down into the Lost John's master cave with Dick not far behind. Kindly Tony passed his harness up and I was able to join them as they returned from upstream, where they had turned round at a deep pool. The stomp was now on down to the sump. Despite both Tony and I having been to the bottom of the Lost John's pitches and down to Groundsheet junction, we'd never actually been to the sump, so it was great to be there, especially as we hadn't been expecting to be able to make it down into the streamway.

In spite of the increasing weight of rope below and the worrying rubbing of the rope above as I removed a deviation, I felt really pleased that we'd all made it down to the sump, an added bonus to an already great trip. Shouts of, "Hurry up, we're freezing.", signalled my proximity to the tree and I hauled the now burgeoning tackle sack up the steep slope above, rope spilling from it as it was dumped finally on horizontal ground.

It was then back into the long line of everyone making their way back across the moor to the cars, headlights acting as a homing beacon to weary cavers. Though the moors had been crowded, we were the only customers in the welcoming Whoop Hall, though we hope they did have at least one other guest, a large gentleman in a rabbit onesy passing the bar causing me to lose track of the conversation on a couple of occasions.  

A few years ago the barman had complained that no one had mid week work's Christmas do's anymore and though he didn't raise it again, it certainly felt that things were even quieter this year. Changed social attitudes to drink driving (which I'm definitely not complaining about); cheap supermarket drink (which I definitely appreciate); a decade of austerity?  Whatever the reason I hope that there are enough people stopping in each week to keep country pubs like this one open, it would be a sad end to the night without half an hour of chat round a warming fire.

6th December 2018 - Jingling all the way

As we're now properly into advent and it's raining, a cave without a stream and a festive name felt in order and so off to Jingling we set.

The fog was thick as we eeked our way along the Kingsdale road, trying to pick out the relevant gate and parking spot.  Fortunately, even though it looked pretty miserable through the windscreen, the change wasn't too bad and we were soon heading up the hill to the Turbury road.

I don't know how many times we've headed up this way, but we always seem to arrive at a wall not fully sure which way to turn to get to a gate.  On this occasion we chose correctly and after a few metres arrived at the gate allowing access to the road.  What could have been quite a long search for the pot was made infinitely easier by Dick's GPS and the familiar entrance soon emerged from out of the clag.

The last time I'd done this pot was with Tony and we'd had to engage skills from our distant past as we unceremoniously lunged for tree branches, selecting the thickest to wrap slings around in order to rig the first pitch.  It turns out though that this is the same pot I'd also previously done with Dick and his niece and nephew, which begins with a lovely descent down a short gully, before a fine traverse along a ledge overlooking the main pot.  As two and two were slowly put together in my brain, Dick set off down the lovely gully.

Despite this being a "dry" pot under normal conditions, the last bolt on the traverse seemed to be under a leak of some sort and I didn't envy Dick even though he was rigging swiftly. A short descent from the traverse dropped us into the lateral cleft, where we swapped rigging duties.  This really is a superb little pot, with some terrific positions, the homely cleft ejecting us once more into the dank open shaft.  Oh for a deviation, the "leak" from the end of the traverse seemingly having increased in volume by this point.

The final pitch dropped us into the bottom of the rift and while each end of it soon closed down, a dig at the foot of the rope offered a way on.  The tail of the rope offered a useful hand line down the dug shaft, but I wasn't tempted by the horizontal continuation and I squirmed my way back up to the bottom of the pitch.

Even given the traverse's leak, which managed to deposit a drip right down by neck, we emerged onto the moor mostly dry and warm.  I could definitely get used to this type of caving!  We're also getting quite used to finishing the evening in the Marton Arms and it's great to see that they've even a few caving prints on the walls too.