Saturday - 24th June 2000
People present - Duncan Jones, Pete Dale, Pete & Julie Mohr (aka Zig & Zag)

Arriving at Nidderdale I drove down to Scar House Reservoir to check the water levels and they were (thankfully) about 4ft below the ledges, relieved at getting the first problem out of the way we headed back to Limley Farm to obtain permission. On our way there we drove past Zig & Zag and Zig told us he had just been done for overtaking, caught nicely on camera!! Permission gained we joined Zig & Zag and started to get changed, it didn't look like anyone else was showing so we set off for Goyden Pot.

A nice easy walking passage led us into Goyden and before we knew it we were looking into the main passage from ledges up in the wall, we soon realised our mistake and headed back. We met a Black Sheep Digger and he told us the right way to go and also suggested a few passages that were worth going down. Leaving him behind to get on with his digging we entered the main passage which is quite an impressive size and continues for a reasonable distance and has a considerable amount of flood debris wedged everywhere. Passing Gaskells passage which we would return to later on we got closer to the sump and found a tree wedged across the passage (yes a tree, well ok it was a very big section of tree anyway!) the sump unfortunately arrived and we headed off down Labyrinth passage.

A short upwards crawl in Labyrinth passage and you reach the stage where passages go off in all directions (none of us did work out why it was called Labyrinth) a bit of crawling later we were climbing up a ladder up the '10ft climb'. An nice impressive passage was followed to where it meets 'cap left crawl' at this point we turned round and retraced our step. A quick visit was paid to another passage with a fine formation, more formations followed but they were coated in mud which provided us with a reminder that this place fills completely! Zig & Zag retraced there steps back to the main passage, but Pete had me crawling down some obscure side passages to get there.

Back in the main passage we headed back to Gaskells passage, neither Zig or Zag wanted to climb up into it, so me and Pete went up and looked for the recently found Black Sheep passage which takes you to the new entrance of Church Pot. We soon realised that the climbs had rope and ladders on them so we headed back to Zig & Zag and told them but they still didn't want to climb up (they were both carrying ankle injuries) so they headed out via the main passage and we made our way out of Church Pot. The passage is easy enough to negotiate and we soon reached the climb up, it starts easy but they becomes narrower but not tight just a little bit awkward, most people would get past it.

After surfacing we made our way back to the Main entrance and waited for Zig & Zag to appear, we had to go back into the cave just to avoid being eaten alive by the bloody midges! One cave done we headed off to Manchester Hole, along the way Zag came to the conclusion that a disabled caving club should be started to cater for the walking wounded! The entrance to Manchester Hole was soon found and we clambered down into the cave and entered another impressively sized passage, much walking later we reached the downstream sump, it would be nice if a dry connection could be found, the digger we spoke to earlier said they were within 20ft of that connection, good luck to them. We all made our way out back to the cars to get changed, well Zig & Zag got changed me and Pete stayed in our caving gear and headed off for How Stean Gorge.

We parked a short distance down the road from How Stean to avoid paying £2.50 each, out of the car and into the stream which we headed upstream until we climbed upwards and found the entrance to Tom Taylors Cave (this brought back early caving memories for me) after quickly polishing that one off and making comments on the rotten wooden steps in the cave Pete saw the bridge. Of course he also saw a group of young women getting ready to abseil off it! that was it no stopping him, back to the car to get the gear. I opted out of this because my leg was starting to give me hassle by an injury playing 5aside football earlier in the week. I got changed and Pete headed off to the bridge, I hobbled over to a lower bridge where I hoped I could get a couple of photos from. A quick abseil, followed by prusik and another abseil Pete headed upstream in the direction of How Stean Tunnel, that was after he'd carried ducklings all the way round the gorge to the cafe only to be told that they hatch in the gorge (oops!).

The Goyden system is very interesting and worth visiting, I will be going back there to do New Goyden Pot next time. Admittedly its out of the way for a lot of people, but its worth making the effort to go there (just make sure you pick a dry day!)

Pete's version of events..
"Goyden and the Gorge adventure!"

Well, another club trip had arrived, this time it was 'Goyden pot' and to my amazement three red rose members had phoned to say that they were coming on the trip (Strange, didn't know red rose members went caving).

Well Saturday morning arrived, Duncan said he would be picking me up at 7.30am so that we could get there early and get a few of the caves in 'How Stean Gorge' rattled off (Yeah right! It was well after 8 when he finally turned up).

When we arrived in Lofthouse we found the road up to 'Goyden' so off we went to check the reservoir water level. Good, it hadn't rained so the water was 4ft off the overflow. We drove back down to get permission off the farmer. Permission granted, we met Zig & Zag at the handy car park where to my surprise, they put theirs and another lads name down for 'White Scar' (At last members actually coming on club trips). All changed we set off down towards the cave entrance. Reaching the final gate Pete noted the flood debris interwoven in the fence, which was roughly 20ft higher than the cave! (Must get wet). Facing an air assault of Midges we hastily got underground into depths of 'Goyden'.

Entering the pot you walk down an ever-enlarging streamway. Pete was leading at this point and he reported to me that we needed a ladder to get down the pitch even though there wasn't one according to the guidebook. So Pete shot off down another passage closely followed by Duncan while I took the more tactical approach by having a quick natter with one of the diggers from the Black Sheep club.

The way on was found which led to a series of climbs down huge chunks of limestone and finally the main stream way. It was at about this point that I mentioned to Duncan about the huge tree trunks wedged across the top of the chamber which was well over thirty feet above us! We followed the meandering stream till we reached the sump where we took a left turn and entered Labyrinth passage on our way to Five ways chamber. From Five ways we followed a north passage till we reached a short length of ladder which led up into Cap tunnel.

After exploring around there for a bit and forcing Duncan to follow me down a body sized wet crawl to avoid the nasty five foot ladder climb down! At 'A' junction, Duncan and me went one way and I sent Zig and Zag the other because I fancied a look around the Labyrinth itself. After getting hopelessly lost we re-traced our steps, found Zig and Zag and set off back towards the main chamber. On the way out of the cave, Pete mentioned about a flood escape route that had been found, which apparently enters 'Goyden' from Gaskell's passage.

We found the climb up to Gaskell's where I ascended first followed by Pete, who at the top of the climb chickened out and went back down. Duncan came up and Pete said he'd give us half an hour to look around to find the way out which we did. We went back, told Pete we would meet him at the entrance of 'Goyden'. We parted company and made good our exit.

After waiting a couple of minutes for Zig and zag to remerge we then thought we would have a quick look down 'Manchester hole' which we did (I'm not writing any more as Pete is also writing this trip up). We went back to the cars where we tried to persuade Zig and Zag to come with us to do a couple of caves in How Stean Gorge but with no success. So we said our goodbyes and off Duncan and me went to see what we could find.

We parked at the car park at the bottom of the gorge to avoid paying the £2.50 charge at the café. Off we went trundling up the stream crossing from one side to the other till we got to the entrance of 'Tom Taylor's Cave' where we played around for a bit, amusing the tourists with our agility and no-sense approach to caving! We even answered a few questions about our hobby to the bewildered punters who were happy with just the light from a lighter!

We emerged from the cave which, incidentally, is a 180m long walking passage emerging in the car park at How Stean Gorge café. We peered down a couple of other caves in the area and decided not to bother with them. It was at this point that I noticed a group of people stood on the road bridge over the gorge, rigging a rope to abseil down we had a quick look and I decided I wanted to have a go.

A quick sprint back to the car to get the necessary gear where Duncan started complaining of an injury he had required somehow and decided that abseiling off the bridge wasn't for him. So I was on my own (But not for long!).

When I got to the bridge, most of the group had already got to the bottom (Did I mention they were all women?). I rigged up a nice triple hang for the roughly 15m descent, attached myself to the rope, hopped over the railings and in true SAS style, careered to the bottom as fast as I could. After a nice graceful landing at the bottom and a few comments from the other group and some clapping from the people on the bridge, I gave a quick bow and floated back up the rope without stopping to the top. I then hung just below the bridge out of sight to get my breath back because I was knackered! I then swapped back to my descender and went back down to join the other group for a spot of canyoning.

We progressed upstream where they traversed round the deep pools and just walked through them (I had to look good, I also had my wetsuit on!). At one point they had to jump from one side to the other over a 5ft gap with very deep water in the middle (I couldn't touch the bottom anyway). A couple of more traverses and we were at the entrance to How Stean Tunnel where we didn't wait around as we were being eaten alive by midges. After going through the tunnel (using no lights whatsoever) we emerged at the other side. I then switched my light on and raced back to the bridge to derigg the pitch. I then wizzed back through Tom Taylor's to the car and got changed. We then went to find a chippy for you know what!

A good day was had by all, especially by me and thanks to Zig, Zag and Duncan for coming on the trip. After all, it is a CAVING CLUB!! Isn't it?