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Trip Reports

Trip report: North Yorkshire Moors 6th-7th June 2009

The caving group visited Excalibur Pot in the North Yorkshire Moors at the beginning of June. Excalibur Pot was one of the most significant cave discoveries in Britain in 2007. It was found and explored by Gary and Matt, GOC members, and their colleagues in York and Scarborough Caving Clubs (for a description of the discovery, the work they put in, and some excellent pictures, see Descent issue number 202, June/July 2008). The North Yorkshire Moors are a relatively untapped caving area, and Excalibur Pot is the largest cave in the area! We spent some hours squeezing, crawling, and walking around this fascinating and varied cave, glad to be somewhere sheltered after a very wet Friday night on the campsite in Hutton-le-Hole. We eventually reached the main underground streamway where we were glad to be able to walk comfortably down a beautiful passage with abundant calcite decorations.

A small team including Matt and Martin from GOC then split off to explore a promising lead in an area of the cave too restricted for everyone to join in. Their plan was to move or remove a large boulder that was blocking the way ahead, although crawling height passage could be seen beyond. Martin investigated and reckoned that moving a different boulder a little bit would make access possible. A large crow-bar did the necessary job, and the team squeezed through, finding an estimated couple of hundred metres of previously unexplored passage of great significance to the hydrology of the cave. These finds have still to be surveyed but should take the total length of the cave towards a mile, making Excalibur one of the longest UK caves in Jurassic limestone.

On the Sunday we went to look at Bogg Hall Rising – the resurgence from Excalibur Pot and almost certainly other sinks in the area. Entering Bogg Hall Rising is a wet experience. A shuffle down a steep, tight slope drops you into shallow water in a low passage, but a few steps further on the floor slopes steeply down and you find yourself moving through water well above waist height. Negotiating a block sticking out from the wall necessitates a brief dip up to the neck before you climb out of the water for a few feet and then drop back into it. It is at this point that getting properly wet becomes unavoidable. In dry conditions, you climb over a block and then edge forward with water up to your neck in a passage which is barely shoulder height and water-filled to that level, but which obligingly provides a head-sized slot in its roof so that you can breath. In wetter conditions, the size of the airspace diminishes and on this day, after heavy rain earlier in the weekend, the airspace was a matter of inches. As water was likely to be rising rather than falling, we decided that continuing would not be wise. We made an aqueous retreat and waded/swam down the river outside by way of alternative entertainment, before spending several hours in a sunny garden, drinking tea and eating our way through a boulder-pile of rock buns as guests of Richard, the local expert on caves of the area.

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Trip Report: North Wales 18th-19th July 2009

The caving group were in Wales on July 18th and 19th, to visit some mines under the guidance of local expert, Alan. Those of us travelling from Yorkshire were happy to drive away from torrential rain on the Friday to the better conditions in benign North Wales, where it was mildly damp.

Saturday dawned cloudy but dry and by the time we had climbed to the upper entrance to Rhiw Bach mine in Cwm Penmachno we were ready for subterranean coolness. The immense entrance, big enough to admit a modest-sized tank, is barred by gates strong enough to keep one out, but a cunningly-hidden side entrance allows access to flexible objects of human dimensions. Rhiw Bach was a slate mine, and we were shown around stopes – man-made caverns following the best seams of slate – of astonishing size as we descended a series of levels. In one place the marks of shot-holes showed a clear discontinuity at one joint in the strata, indicating that even in the relatively few years since the blasting the strata have shifted. We exited along an adit in which a tramway remains complete with one truck, affording opportunities for free rides as long as other cavers are willing to push, and found ourselves well back down the hill and not far from where our cars were parked.

On Sunday, Alan took us to Parys Mountain Copper Mine on Anglesey. Commencing operations in the bronze age, blossoming in the nineteenth century, and continuing to operate until the 1980s, in its heyday it dominated the world copper market. Even now it is not closed, only mothballed. We saw dynamite still in its wooden box, where it has lain since Victorian times, stone tools used to mine the ore by bronze age workers four thousand years ago, and bits and pieces left by workers in the 1900s. Stalactites and stalagmites have grown in many places, along with great quantities of disgustingly-named “snottite” – slimy threads and curtains created by bacteria that get their energy from the suphide ores in the mine. There are alcoves to better anything the horror movie industry has dreamed up. To add to the air of impending evil, vague whiffs of sulphur come and go, sometimes dispelled by the garlic-odour of arsine gas which comes from arsenic deposits in the mine. Pools of acidic water deeper than you want to know about lie waiting for the unwary passer-by who stands unwisely on a rotting plank.

But with the guidance of someone who understands mines, the horrors are mostly in the mind. We followed largely safe and well-used passages and viewed all these things as might a ghost-train rider in a theme park. When we came out, the sun was shining and we enjoyed a walk round the huge opencast mine before – oh no, dare we mention it? – the traditional GOC Sunday-afternoon cream tea and the long drive home, tired but happy.

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Trip Report: Yorkshire 22nd August 2009

The compromise reached in the car park at the Dalesbridge campsite near Settle on Saturday 22nd may find historical significance for its break with accepted convention. Any properly constructed compromise is founded upon leaving all parties equally dissatisfied. On this occasion, the question was whether an introductory trip should go to Calf Holes or Long Churn. The compromise, reached within minutes, was to do both. It pleased everybody equally.

Calf Holes is a good introduction for the most nervous beginner because everything about it is straightforward. Admittedly, it starts with a climb down a ladder into a stream, but the climb is short and in daylight, and the stream is only just deep enough to come over the tops of your wellies. Will it ever be explained why cavers wear wellies, given that they invariably end up full of water? Never mind. Tradition is all.

You do not splash downstream in Calf Holes for long before you come to a place where the water disappears down through the stones and the way on is along a dry passage. A bit further on you turn into a side passage and find yourself again with the water. If you were entirely witless you could elect to stay with the water down a series of rapids and over a fifteen foot waterfall, but it is generally considered more appropriate to wriggle into a low side passage above the stream and follow that. It leads to an easy climb down and you find yourself back with the stream beyond the waterfall. After few minutes of wading you see daylight, and soon after that you emerge from an entrance maybe half a mile from the one where you entered.

It is not far to drive from there to the parking place near to Alum Pot, into which descends Lower Long Churn cave. We started, though, with Upper Long Churn. It offers the entertainment of a tricky waterfall descent (aided with a rope to cling to) and a delicate step onto a ledge where misjudgement means a ducking in a deep, cold pool. One member of the party, wishing to be in the best position to take photographs, went in there on purpose, but he was wearing a wetsuit and so he did not care. Everyone else managed to stay of out of it. Lower Long Churn, which you may not be surprised to learn is downstream of Upper Long Churn, is perhaps the most popular introduction to caving in Yorkshire. It offers everything – traverses around deep pools, a tight squeeze with a by-pass for those who do not want to try it, a climb in a rift and a free climb, and finally a ladder descent to a wide passage leading to a ledge half way down Alum Pot and thus affording one of the most spectacular views to be found in UK caving. Back almost at the entrance to Lower Long Churn, we elected to leave by the entertaining route, which is a low crawl in the stream. The sun was still shining and only the midges threw a cloud over the proceedings – literal and metaphorical – as we got changed.

I have been to Lower Long Churn cave so many times that I have lost count, but it still delights me every time. Come on you guys. This is an introductory cave. In the immortal words of the governor of California and one-time noted body-builder, “You can do it”. Visit Lower Long Churn with us next time!

Trip Report: Daren Cilau 3rd October 2009

Popular opinion places Daren Cilau at the head of the list of things to experience only once, but popular opinion is not always right.

The reason for Daren Cilau’s dark reputation is that it is hard work. The lengthy entrance passage requires sustained crawling and sidling through restricted spaces for close to an hour if you are average – less if you are remarkable but a good deal longer if you are not on top form. Getting out again would weigh on your mind in any cave, but in Daren Cilau the going continues to be exhausting. Things start all right with a stomp along a big passage, where the only issue is that it is rather a long way. Then come more squeezes and crawls, a climb up a twenty metre ladder followed soon after by a descent of twenty metres involving two strenuous climbs aided by knotted ropes, and an hour or two staggering through slippery boulders. You will not be reaching the far confines of the cave, because to do so takes so long that it is usual to camp underground for at least one night, but wherever you decide to turn back, you have to repeat all the boulder hopping, climbing, and crawling until you finally surface. Since it is almost always dark by the time you do that, you may not easily be convinced that you really are out.

So what draws GOC Caving Group back to Daren Cilau, which we visited again on 3rd October? For a start, the big passages that you find really are big and impressive. The route through the boulders in the passage called the Time Machine is now marked with reflective catseyes and seeing them fading into the distance you realise how long it is. Then there are the formations. They are sparse in Daren Cilau but the ones that are there are remarkable. In Bonsai Passage, for example, you find groups of helictites looking just like miniature trees. Rather less sparse are extensive patches of selenite crystals shining white in the light of your lamp. On our recent trip we made an erroneous turn on the way out and found ourselves in Crystal Oxbow, with colourful flowstone on the walls and floor. But perhaps the strongest reason for returning is the pleasure and satisfaction in dealing with the physical and navigational challenges to reach some of the remotest spots in Britain.

Sunday dawned gloriously sunny and we set off on one of those short walks that gets longer as the day develops, just because you really do not want it to end. We dallied to eat quantities of wild blackberries, remarkably sweet wild damsons, and an occasional sour sloe. We stopped to admire a field of happy free-range hens, who galloped over to admire us. We lunched in Abergavenny and strolled back beside the river to our campsite.

Yes, we were tired and bruised from the caving, but some of us were planning another visit to Daren Cilau even as we drove home.

Trip Report 14th February 2010 – Finding the Wretched Rabbit

Avid readers of GOC caving news might just remember that our most recent failure to find the Wretched Rabbit was way back in 2006. We have not been looking for it ever since, but we did give it another go on February 14th 2010. This time, to give fate a fair crack of the whip, we approached from an entirely different direction, on a route supposedly more complicated than the one we chose in 2006. We had attempted it several times in the distant past without success.

Wretched Rabbit is a passage and entrance to the Three Counties complex of caves, on the borders of Cumbria, Lancashire, and North Yorkshire. On this occasion our approach was from Top Sink – the entrance farthest up Easegill dale. Being in possession of a copy of the relevant description from Not for the Faint-Hearted, a splendidly detailed and reliable book in our experience, we slid down the entrance shaft confident of success – so confident that we decided to risk all and do a pull-through. That is, we would abseil down the two pitches along the Top Entrance route, pulling the ropes after us. In the event this did not quite work out because when we came to pull down the first rope, at the “Walrus” pitch, it would not budge. Gary had rigged the pitch and I had come down last. One of us was to blame, but it would not be clear who until we re-entered the cave from Top Entrance at the end of the trip to recover the rope.

Pulling down the rope from the second pitch, “Penknife” pitch, went smoothly and we set off on a damp crawl. We were already wet and cold from the water that came down the two pitches but despite crawling in several inches of water we were soon warm at the speed we were going. The onward journey involved many turnings-off that were by no means obvious, along with some interesting hops across deep rifts as the passages we followed meandered back and forth high above the stream. In more than one place we came to the seemingly impossible, only to find on reading our instructions that there was a cunning way round the problem. After about two and half hours we found ourselves in Stop Pot – familiar to two people in the group – and we knew we (or rather, our book) had cracked the route-finding. An hour later we had hauled ourselves up the ropes fixed on the pitches in the Wretched Rabbit passage that lead to the entrance and we were out in the daylight.

We trotted back up to Top Sink and those suspected of being responsible for the debacle on the Walrus pitch went in to recover the rope – Gary and me. We established with certainty who was to blame, but I am not saying anything.

Trip report 22nd March 2010 – Simpson’s Pot to Valley Entrance Pull-through

It was ages since any of us had done one of the classic pull-through trips in Kingsdale, where you enter a cave at the top of the hill and pop out of one at the bottom a few hours later. So last weekend we decided it was time to do one again. The weather for Saturday was forecast to be wet, which might have made parts of the underground journey rather more interesting than the wise would seek to experience. So we settled for Sunday, when more or less dry weather was promised and water levels would be falling rather than rising. We chose Simpson’s Pot rather than Swinsto. It has more variety, less crawling, an entertaining duck, and the fun of the big pitch into Slit Pot.

The trip proper was preceded by a quick gallop in and out of Valley Entrance to install an all-important ladder. Without it, your options at the end of the trip would be either to set about an alarming free climb or to sit in a cold stream for many hours and hope for rescue. Having put the ladder and lifeline in place we set off up the hill. To our considerable pride, we found the entrance almost at once. Or to be fair, Gary found it. It lurks inconspicuously among the vegetation, and I have not forgotten the ignominy of wandering about on the fell for the best part of an hour looking for it on a previous occasion.

The cave starts out unremarkably with meandering passages that alternate between inconvenient stooping height and crawly bits. Interest picks up with a traverse over the top of a pot. Restricted headroom reduces you to a low crawl across a gap that you at first think looks a bit longer than you are, but which turns out to be all right once you set about it. Thereafter some short climbs – some with an abseil alternative for the less brave – bring you to the first real pitch. We did not pull the rope after us immediately because we knew what came next. Martin descended Storm Pot on our second rope and checked the duck that connects with the way on from the bottom. In wet conditions the air space can disappear and if that had been the case, we would have chosen retreat. It turned out to be the way it usually is. It looks alarming because the rock is so shaped that there is only just enough room to get your head into the gap above the water, but if you go feet first you find that a step down allows you to adopt a comfortable stance and the distance forward before you can stand up with head and shoulders well above the water is less than half a metre.

A few more pitches and a surprising variety of stretches of passage led us to the top of Slit Pot. The passage we were in terminated at a high crack, mostly narrower than the thickness of a man, but with one bit as wide as a slighly squashed man lying sideways a metre or so up in the air. On the other side is a drop of about thirty metres. Having rigged a rope by reaching through the slot, you attach yourself to it and then struggle head first, sideways, into space. Assuming you are successful, you are all set to abseil to the bottom (having never witnessed failure, I am not sure what you are set to do if you are not successful, but I guess it is to starve slowly where you are). We were all successful, and each enjoyed a wet descent under the modest waterfall that takes the same route.

A clamber down a slope, another one down a hole in the boulders, and a short crawl, brought us to the master cave where we followed the stream down to where we had placed the ladder earlier in the day. Soon after that we were back in daylight and it only remained for us to spend the evening trying to sort out a car problem with the RAC. But that is another story.

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