Tag: Dales

By Tom C In Day Trips

County to Lancaster

Jason reports:

A County/Lancaster exchange on a Wednesday night?  We wondered if we were being over-ambitious.  But a splinter group kindly volunteered to rig Lancs, have a shorter trip and come out the same way, so the rest of us set off remarkably promptly at 6pm.  We had a close encounter with a barn owl on the way, probably having disturbed his tea.  Oddly enough, a dead vole lay on the lid of County – we put it to one side in case the owl was still hungry.

I utterly failed to trace our route on the survey afterwards, but I can reveal that we went via Battle of Britain Chamber, the Trident series, dropping into Lower Pierce’s Passage (a nice free climb, though some faint-hearts called for a rope!), thence to Eureka junction where we stopped to rest and pose for some photos.  The water was still fairly low; the dry spell had broken a few days earlier, but there had not been much rain that day.

From there to Stop Pot posed the only navigational challenge – the dry route through the boulder choke seemed no longer to exist.  In the end, we just had to follow the water and get wet (the horror!).  Onwards through the high-level caverns (Monster, Snail, Corne’s and Oake’s – at least the survey told me that much), admiring the many stalactites, including the Halberdiers.  Apparently the French say that it’s raining halberds instead of cats and dogs, which arguably makes more sense…

John showed us the Minarets bypass, whereupon we all followed him rather than enjoy the usual delights of those passages.  Soon we reached Oxbow Corner, and having decide to take the wet route out, John announced that the next bit through the boulder choke was a bit complex, so keep together.  If I’d have said that, it would be the prelude to getting thoroughly lost, but he led us unerringly through.  A splendid romp through down the Main Drain followed. 

There was plenty of foam on the walls at the downstream sump, so water levels had been higher.  I scooped up some foam and applied it to my chin, trying for a Santa look, but it didn’t really work.

Up Fall Pot and to the entrance pitch, it was good to see that it was still rigged!  But looking up, what was that?  Blimey, daylight!  It seemed like we had been underground for ages, but it was not much after 9:30. The good time was less due to our rapid pace than to the expert route-finding – an excellent trip.

Photos courtesy of Darren.

By Tom C In Day Trips

Illusion Pot

Wednesday night saw us taking advantage of the dry spell for a bit of caving in Illusion Pot, Kingsdale. After exploiting a variety of parking options – mine as usual seeming to be the furthest away from the actual cave – we met up, walked and began the search for the covered entrance in a shakehole.  In this crack team of speleo-explorers were Darren, Ali, Jason, Tony and myself; Tony and Ali had the excuse of never having been down Illusion before, and I mumbled something about it ‘being all snowy the last time I was here’, leaving Jason and Darren to put us on the right track.  After some determined searching they found the way in, and we all descended the fixed ladders into the underworld.

Muddy passages led to a bailable duck, but today the water levels were low enough to get through without any difficulty. Refreshingly moistened, we continued into the impressive chamber of the Missile Silo, and then Ali led the way up into The Pretties…  Here are some beautiful straws, curtains and even helictites, which we were careful not to sully with our muddy hands.

We had a look at a dig in the floor that led to a flat out crawl, then retraced our steps into the Missile Silo.  At the far end, passing some fine orange speleothems, is the way down to the sump.  Jason, Ali and Darren went along the roped traverse while Tony and I waited and marvelled at the cobbles which were stuck to the chamber walls by only a thin calcite cement – the remains, we supposed, of a past floor at a higher level in the chamber.

The three returned with reports of a final squeeze (which Jason had explored), and we then made our way back out to the surface, emerging to a cloudless evening.  We bum-slid back down the steep hill to Darren’s car (which was great fun, so much that Tony went back up again!).
All said, Illusion is a good and varied trip, and definitely worth a look if you haven’t been before.  Thanks for an entertaining evening fellas!

By Tom C In Day Trips

Dowbergill

Gareth and Darren, knowing that we had undertaken the traverse from Providence Pot to Dow Cave on 2 previous occasions, had asked if they could be included on a further trip. What further trip?!! Was my response. The first time had taken us 6 and a half hours and was replete with arguments caused by neither of us knowing at what point it was safe to descend, several wrong descent decisions, a very scarey traverse and feeling bloody cold. The second time had been faster (just over 4 hours) but this was more by luck than judgement. We didn’t find the scarey traverse and instead found a rigged line down to the streamway. We had ventured along to the swim under the boulder but, without having read up on how long a complete submersion was needed, we retreated and climbed up onto the Gypsum Traverse in a near hypothermic state. On the positive side, it was a sunny day and we warmed up considerably with the long walk back to Kettlewell.

This time, the date chosen followed the snowfall and coincided with the snowmelt. Andy and I checked out the possibility of leaving a car at the end, feeling sure Gareth had a 4 by 4. He doesn’t—so even the drive to Dow was quite eventful! We almost got the correct gear in correct cars. Gareth was left at the end without shoes (& I’d left home in wellies, so had none either) and the flask of hot drink was left in the car at Kettlewell. But beer and tea bread were ready for us on exit.

A beautiful walk through the snow was followed by a swift passage through the entrance series. I could remember it all—except the Blasted Crawl through muddy water—how could I forget that! About 1.5h into the trip saw us enjoying hot chocolate in the 800yd Chamber—the half way point in distance terms. I had managed to get very wet and so was beginning to feel cold but everyone else had successfully navigated the climbs, traverses and squeezes staying relatively dry.

‘Is this Brew Chamber?’ was the much asked question over the next 2.5hrs. We did several boulder choke climbs and several squeezes at stream level, but still nothing fell into place. And it was only a short distance on the survey. We knew when we had reached the choke though. A dodgy handline stretched 12m up the vertical rift and was navigated without (major) incident by Darren and Andy. Gareth and myself had considerably more difficulty. By the time Gareth had reached the top I had tried on 3 occasions to squeeze myself through the very awkward short cut (an upwards and leftwards squeeze that wouldn’t let me through) and I had lost functional use of all points of contact before it was my turn to climb. Needless to say, Andy and Darren did a fantastic job of hauling me up the difficult bits and soon (ish) we were all in Brew Chamber.

We found the line down to the stream again and so, 20 minutes later we were standing in water, in an impressive rift passage varying between sideways walking and thrutchy traversing just above the water level. The levels had risen in the time we’d spent in the cave and the final portion of the passage to the sumped boulder necessitated a helmets off, chin (just about) above water level approach. On arrival at the boulder, there was no going back—we were far too cold by this point. So, aided by Andy’s leg as a dive line, one by one we submerged and re-emerged, ecstatic at having survived the ordeal!

Dow Cave is an amazing passage and we did stop twice for Gareth’s photo shoots but, teeth chattering uncontrollably, we probably didn’t appreciate it’s full geological worth….well there was a beer and tea bread waiting!

By Tom C In Day Trips

Lancaster Hole

We all got to the bottom safely and off we went through into Fall pot, we went at a steady pace so Ali could take it all in, we eventually ended up taking some great photos at Bob’s Boss and the Painters Pallet then with a bit of memory searching for the way on we eventually made it to the Minarets without finding Diamond hall first, I took some backlit photos to try and do my best to copy the Northern Caves photo it wasn’t perfect but I thought it would do, we then stuck ourselves through the link into the way on to Retched rabbit etc.

By Tom C In Day Trips, Expeditions

Christmas Meet 2016

A great Christmas “Do”, a trip to Wet Grooves mine followed by great company and food. Thanks to Helen and Andy for leading the mine trip and for the use of Hardraw Old School Bunk House

Wet Grooves mine is not as unpleasant as the name might imply and when we visited it was dry as a bone until the lowest level. There is an interesting climb down a cork-screw shaft but care is needed as it is loose in places. There are a few side passages and short loops to explore and there is plenty of geological interest.

By Tom C In Day Trips

Roger Kirk Cave

A Ribblehead classic, but neither James nor I had done it before.
Found the East Sink entrance ok (thanks, Garmin), and as the water levels were fairly low, we made it through the Tube without flipping onto our backs, thereby keeping a small area round our shoulders dry.
Kudos to James as he hasn’t got a proper undersuit!

Found our way to Middle Entrance, popped out, admired the view, back down again to the lower entrances – both of them although the last one did seem like wallowing for the sake of it.

Back to the cars as light was fading, and we had our photos taken with the viaduct in the background by a nice lady who said we looked incredible. But we knew that!

By Tom C In Day Trips

Birks Fell

A good trip to a fine cave – we didn’t get as far as we hoped, as the navigation isn’t as straightforward as the survey suggests. I’d heard it was pretty (it is), so took my camera, but all the underground pictures were well down to my usual standard. So here is a picture of an exceptionally fine formation above ground..

Birks Fell, Andy

By Jason Clements In Day Trips

Dismal Hill to Old Ing – 18th May 2011

Dismal Hill      Chris H, Andy G, Jason

A skeleton crew of three tackled Dismal Hill – obviously the rest of the club had done it before!
In fact, they missed a fine trip; not long, but full of variety and interest.
The entrance is tucked away in a hollow just to the left of the path from High Birkwith.  A brief crawl led to a couple of nice climbs.  Turning left, I knew I was looking for a tight bedding plane, and quickly found one about 8” high with 6” of water.  If this was the way on, it was to a short trip indeed!

Fortunately, Andy had turned right along a short passage well supplied with sheep bones and found a slightly more spacious bedding plane, which he was kind enough to let me investigate.  It started off tight and continued that way for what felt like a long time (probably about 50m!) until it emerged – much to my relief – in a nice decorated streamway.
Turning downstream, a narrow but pleasant passage goes for about 150m, getting deeper until you have to swim if you want to get to the sump.  We declined.

Upstream also gets deeper, but a thoughtfully-provided traverse line allows you to stay dry – at least above waist-level.  The scum on the wall showed the water level had recently been much higher still.
A climb up leads to another crawl, soon emerging at an impressive waterfall – we were now in the sump bypass part of Old Ing.  An exciting climb up the waterfall (fortunately roped) led to some more damp passageway.  A little before another sump, there’s a climb up to yet another flat-out crawl (Mick’s End) that showed signs of having been blasted out – ie lots of sharp rubble to inch over.  At least it was fairly short.
This emerged in the roof of the main Old Ing streamway via a particularly tight bit, which Andy’s manly chest proved too much for.  A pity, because the exit was only a short upstream stroll away…

After establishing that the squeeze really wasn’t in Andy’s size, he engaged reverse gear to come out the way we’d come in, followed by me, while Chris went out of Old Ing to fetch a ladder to save us the trouble of at least one of the crawls.

Meanwhile, Andy and I positively raced along – it’s amazing how much time you save by knowing where you’re going and not trying to stay dry! – and decided not to hang around for Chris in the streamway.  Again, we made good time to the exit, but not quite soon enough to stop Chris rigging the ladder in the ‘new’ entrance and descending to the streamway!  Never mind, at least he clocked up 3 different entrances to the system …  And he did find out where the ‘new’ pitch comes out – just before the traverse line in the upstream end of the passage, so now you know…