For all trips after this year please see Forum log book.
24th January 2015 – Swinst-no. Valley Entrance
A two person excursion in to Swinsto, one wasn’t keen, so we exited and went for a jolly in Valley Entrance instead.
17th January 2015 – Large Pot -Rift Pot
FULL REPORT due
A three man team undertook a Large Rift exchance. Cold icy weather abound..
11th January 2015 – FOUL Pot
The forecast for this Sunday trip was hardly inspiring, and weatherproof(ish) trips were suggested, such as Pikedaw Calamine Caverns. I would like to say as a disclaimer here that, as anyone with even a slight knowledge of the book of Genesis will testify, there is nothing on Earth that is truly weatherproof. Don Miller, often unfairly accused of failing to understand irony, said he was certain that FOUL Pot on Fountains Fell would be dry. He said there was no streamway in the cave and we would be dry. We were later to find out that he had in fact become a master of speaking ironically.
Don went down the 4m entrance climb first and, while Sharman was peering over the edge, emitted the sort of scream he normally reserves for arachnophobia. Silly old Sharman had knocked some rotten wood down onto Don, who had rightly assumed the whole world was collapsing around him. Anyway, it might not have been much, but there was definitely a stream entering the cave. The first section was therefore a wet, flatout crawl. A short way from here was a wooden ladder, followed by the 16m pitch. At the top of this pitch I saw a bat skeleton. We rigged the pitch with two deviations to stay mostly dry. Immediately after this pitch is a section of rift, which was easy enough, a handline climb and some crawly bits, some of which were a bit moist, into pleasant meandering streamway with some wonderful calcite and very long straws. This cave is only 210m long, so there was never very far between pitches.
We soon arrived at the 40m pitch. Don rigged from 3 bolts on the left wall and a deviation at a similar height on the right wall. When he was rigging I thought he was faffing a bit, but when later I had the opportunity to de-rig this pitch I realised that a long reach is useful. There was a lot of water going down this pitch and I have to admit that if I had been rigging it, I would have turned back before the lower section. There is a ledge part way down the pitch, where Don stopped for a while and we all thought he would retreat. Nonetheless, courageous Dr Miller eventually shouted, ‘Rope free!’ and our hearts sank. Sharman followed and tried to re-rig the pitch out of the water, but found no suitable anchor. I followed and, while it was dry down to the ledge, the deluge in the lower section of the pitch was unrelenting. I carried on to the bottom because I knew Don and Sharman were there, and because once I was in the really wet section I didn’t fancy doing a change-over. I think this may have been the first time I have ever hit the floor of a pitch without seeing it; my visibility rendered so poor from the raging torrent.
Alex Ritchie of the YSS decided to end his journey here and did not descend this pitch.
Two more short pitches followed and then a walk and crawl led to the sump. In this final section of the cave there was little enjoyment, as we all quietly contemplated the return journey and an ascent that would at best be very cold and very wet. We were to find out just how fast it is possible to prusik when required, and once up this pitch the rest of the cave was a breeze. I kept my SRT kit on for the entire outward trip and had no trouble at all. Back in The World, water levels and wind speeds had risen and temperatures had dropped, meaning that getting changed was just awful. We soon headed to the Craven Heifer in Stainforth for hot chocolates and Cointreau.
This is not an all-weather cave.
Chris Sc
3rd January 2015 – County Pot (Mancunian Way)
4 of us (Me, Shaman, Mike & Kelly) Went into Easegill with a look of doing some of the NFTFH Sylvester round trip. We decided to use Langcliffs advice and not try and rig the Sylvester entrance as it would be too wet. Nevertheless I wanted to know where the entrance was for a later time. So that was out first stop. We must have spent 30 minutes looking for it each time coming back to a 3 meter long hole with a stream running into it that did not go anywhere. Anyway by reading the description we deduced that the little cave was in-fact Sylvester pot and although the water was only a few inches deep a recent flood must have buried the way on so when it does eventually dry out the entrance would need digging out it seems.
Anyway we used County entrance (We got a permit for both entrances) and followed some of the trip underground with a view of going as far as the end of Mancunian way. We followed the route to Snail cavern though we did not drop the pitch at the end of Manchester bypass and walked round (as we left our SRT kits at County). We then took the obscure side passage from Cornes cavern into Mancunian way. The route from here consists of lots of crawls mainly flat out one of them quite wet. However it is well worth it as you are rewarded with a bit of cracking and well decorated stream way. We did not bring our SRT kits so pulling through the pitches at the end was out of the question (was some old Oxford rope on the pitches) we simply back tracked and exited County. Trip time 4 and a half hours.
My next mission is to see where those pitches at the end of Mancunian way land before committing to the round trip as described in the book. Though I would likely use the County entrance, due to Sylvester being blocked.
Alex
3rd January 2015 – Gorbeck Cave
We have discussed this cave for a couple of years and finally we had decided to go!
It is located on the side of Black Hill overlooking Malham Cove but is about 1 to 1.5 mile walk depending where you park. We parked a little further away because we had a notion to go to Grizedale hole as well (but we didn’t)!
Anyway, Gorbeck is located in the top end of a line of shakeholes near the track. The entrance involves a short climb down followed by a low, clean washed crawl to a small chamber. From there there is more crawling in the stream, mostly of a low nature until you reach a duck (we didn’t see a duck). Soon after, the main stream gets too low so you turn off into a parralel crawl.
This is pretty grim. Basically it is mostly crawling, some flat out in water, then in mud and more crawling until you reach a dig. All I can say is whoever is digging in there is a braver man than most! It is muddy, awkward and generally grim.
We made a hasty exit and after finding the surface with that cruel and cold wind, we decided to give Grizedale a miss because we were both cold and head to the pub instead.
The pub of choice was the Rising Sun in Blacko as we hadn’t visited in years.
All in all, Gorbeck isn’t the most pleasant of caves but has great potential having been dye tested to malham cove hence the perseverance of the digging team. I’m still glad we got there after contemplating the trip on so many occasions.
Rob