People present: Alex Ritchie & John Proctor
Euro Speleo complete with all the social entertainment was the perfect place to introduce John to caving, what with the easy availability of the on-site shop and of course plenty of on-site beer. We also had the YSS climbing wall nearby which we took advantage of to make sure John was happy before taking him on his first SRT trip. I wanted something that was epic in scale but not too technical, also as it was pissing it down, somewhere fairly weather-proof. So it was GG using Small Mammal entrance of choice as both pitches had room for me to take a quick check of how John had rigged his stop before heading down.
The walk up was a right plod in the rain with the weather at the top even worse. I left John to get changed while I headed to the tent to set our call out. With that done we were soon down Small Mammal and down the pitch. The squeeze over calcite that soon followed was passed easily by us both. From there we went down the big pitch. This did not phase John as he is used to large drops being as he describes himself as a “Super Alpinist” which is the technical term used for high altitude mountaineering and climbing. I wonder when I get to be a “Super Caver”?
From there it was into the ever highly impressive GG main chamber which was both flood lit and flooding! Tremendous roaring of water in there. Finally we took a quick visit to mud hall where we climbed to the very bottom.
On the way out we noticed the rest of the system was getting rather wet. Flood was living up to its name, meaning we got completely soaked going past it and even BAR had a moderate amount water coming down it, nothing scary but enough to get you damp.
After another trudge in the rain we got back to Euro Speleo, well actually we tried I think it was the “Partridge” first but it was fully booked so we ate the wonderful and cheap food of Euro Speleo and enjoyed a night our livers won’t soon forget.
.
