With Dunc already in the Ribblehead area after his altruistic Cove Hole rubbish retrieval (many thanks Ged!), we met up near the infamous Station Inn. A few deliberations later and we decided to have a look at Greensett. At an altitude of 556 metres and not far short off the summit of Whernside, this is one of the highest caves in the area. Also, consider the walking distance – 3 hefty miles and a 258 metre ascent!
So with the thought of a 6 mile round trip in mind, we set off on one of the muggiest nights of the year with the local midges in full force to boot.
Finding the cave wasn’t that difficult considering the remoteness and we quickly found one of the 5/6 entrances. There are obvious shakeholes around and about so if anyone ever fancies a trip up there, you’re bound to find a way in somewhere.
Popping through a small hole and you enter a wide passage. Follow this to reach a junction where a right turn takes you to another entrance (read later). We turned left through an interesting looking canal, waist deep in parts. After a few turns and some crawling you pass under another entrance, a 15 foot entrance pitch. This looked free-climbable but covered in moss at the top and care should be taken.
Shortly after this, you have another 2 options, a right turn through a very low duck or a sidewards crawl on the left. Left we went through some nice passage and we soon reached another large entrance. Exiting here we had a mooch about and found 2 more entrances. I decided to go down the one which leads back to the duck. This is a little awkward but interesting with a short and pleasant passage before you reach the duck. This looks very low awkward and nasty, not the grade 2 that NC suggests. Naturally, not needing to go through I headed out. I then headed down the third entrance in this cluster which is another entertaining one. There are a few squeezes in this section before an awkward descent repelled me as I wasn’t certain of my route so I headed back out.
I proceeded to walk across the fell to where the last entrance would have taken me, to locate Dunc who pointed out another entrance. This is a little hole at the bottom of a shakehole. I disappeared on my back and headed through a very muddy passage on hands and knees to the first junction we arrived at originally. I had come full circle and seen virtually all of Greensett Cave.
The walk back took forever, with a lot of chaffing from my undersuit due to being wet to the bone but hot as well, but mercifully we eventually arrived at the vehicles.
We risked a pint in the Station Inn where that grubby little man was still in residence, reminding me of that infamous night, making me shudder too. Note to anyone with sense: never stay overnight here.
All in all, I don’t think I’m wrong in assuming that very few cavers head up to Greensett (even the farmer didn’t know there are caves up there!) but I’m glad we did because it was something totally different.
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