Highs and Lows at Ribblehead

Dave, Maz, Pete, Ray, Scott, Tom, Will
Trip report by Maz

In an effort to try and entice people to a couple of easy caves on Ribblehead Moss, I’d cunningly placed a teaser of treasures in the trip invite. Several folk took the bait…

The truth was, I’d been out and bought 10 cans of lager and was intending to stash them in Thistle and Runscar caves as a treat for the lucky finder.

I arrived an hour and a half early and my plan was to start stashing. I didn’t expect company.

The smell of cannabis hit me before I’d got close to the first shake hole. As I crested, I surprised two somewhat stoned and bemused lads in various bits of caving gear.

Once we had established I was not the drug squad, I went on my way and they stayed put and did their thing. I did half expect my beer to be missing however.

Dutifully, Will, Dave, Tom, Pete, Ray, and Scott arrived with Tom taking first blood by locating beer number 1 on my wheel arch.

Runscar was the first to be explored. The top entrance then transformed into Scar Top Cave with Pete and Dave embarking on a knee busting crawl to nowhere. I had recced this on Monday and didn’t fancy it again. Sensibly the others didn’t either.

The bottom exit proved a bit tight and contorting. Again, there were not many takers.

Onto Thistle and the beer hunt continued. Lots of easy passage with some nice formations. It was surprisingly pleasant. We regrouped at the main entrance and the cannabis smell persisted. Tom found the evidence, a joint butt with suspicious looking sealable plastic bags. It was all taken away. We are a responsible caving club and remove our litter as well as that of others

Only myself, Pete and Dave took the final downstream crawl. The finale was a tight, wet, exit which I had bottled on my recce. Dave took the lead and urged on by those above ground, exited beautifully on his back, barely touching the sides. Having witnessed this impressive feat and listening to everyone’s advice, I chose a face down approach. I hadn’t intended to, but this seemed to be the way my body wanted to go. It was also significantly slower, wetter and less than stylish. Pete having witnessed this inane flailing, chose Dave’s method.

We’d had a nice time at Ribblehead and there were even a couple of beers left for my Mrs when I got back. Thanks to everyone who came along.

Some folk bring cake to meets, some bring rain, others bring new discoveries. I’m leading Mistral in July, I’ll bring the mud instead.