13th January 2012 - Hardrawkin Pot

Dick enjoying the liquid refreshment on offer at the sump pool

Having to meet up later than usual, I'd had a look through the rigging guide for a short trip, not far from the road. Hardrawkin pot with its two short pitches and almost en suite pub seemed to fit the bill. As I'd never heard of it, in fact I'm not sure I can even pronounce it, I wasn't expecting much but as they say, even a bad caving trip is better than a good day in the office.

Changing in the car park above the Hill Inn another car pulled into the lay by and two other cavers began to get changed, their objective the same as ours. Hardrawkin was quickly changing from an unknown pot to the busiest in the Dales.

The short walk was stunning, under a clear, starlit, moon free sky we crunched through the frost on possibly the finest night of the winter so far. The entrance was soon located and Dick made short work of the initial climb down to the stream.

Almost immediately the quality of the trip is apparent with some beautifully shaped passageway, decorated with moon milk. The occasional crawling sections and right angled corners adding further interest.

The first pitch soon arrived along with the realisation that the bolts in this cave had been put in by somebody just an inch or two taller than me. It didn't help that the other two cavers had also arrived at the pitch head and performance anxiety had me firmly in its grip.

As soon as the y-hang was above me, a smile spread across my face. This is a great pitch. Searching for a natural or two to provide deviations to prevent a real soaking, revealing a stunning white gully entering the main shaft. "Rope free" and a quick scurry away from the spray lashed base of the pitch.

On Dick's arrival we decided to use the tail of the rope to descend the first of the little cascades that follow, though god sent holds make the others pure joy. The second and final pitch is soon reached and once again I wished I was just a little bit taller. An uninterrupted descent brings you to the sump pool and once again I quickly left the spray to find a drier vantage point to watch Dick's descent.

Ever the experimentalist, Dick made sure that it really was a flooded shaft at the pitch foot, before it was time to once again turn upwards.

The waterfall meets the sump

Starting the prussik back up

Returning up the second pitch

It always amazes me how little water it takes to produce ominous booming sounds and the return up the pitches was just as exciting as the descent. Not sure if it was the other two returning up the streamway above, but the water flow was far from steady, occasional pulses making me glad I'd followed Dick's advice to put my hood up.

If you're looking for a quick trip and the water's not too high I can highly recommend a trip to Hardrawkin, the Kylie of Yorkshire pot holes and when you're done a warm welcome can be found in the Hill Inn too.

6th January 2012 - Boxhead Pot

Dick near the entrance to Epiglottis Grotto

New years are generally associated with taking on new challenges and so for their first trip of the year, the TNC headed to Boxhead.

The first major challenge came in the form of getting to the Lost Johns' car park, the fog thick on the fell road, with seemingly vertical bits of road appearing out of the gloom in the headlight beams. The second challenge was finding the cave. Walk back down the road to the Lost Johns' gate. Tick. Go over the stile. At this point we realised we'd left the description in the van and so while Dick went to get it I set about finding the stile. As the stile was attached in traditional fashion to a fence, it wasn't too hard to find but then for the next instruction, walk 200m south. Fortunately Dick had picked up his phone with newly installed "compass" app and off we went counting our paces. We had travelled 199m according to the "GPS tracking" app when a halt was called and we felt quite pleased with ourselves, only problem was that there was no sink hole. While I commenced a box search, finding multiple sink holes by falling into them in the ever thickening fog, Dick was hard at work too and the "satellite imagery of where you're stood" app soon saw us at the pot.

We couldn't believe that we'd never been here before, the awesomeness of the pitches matched only by the digger installed plumbing. Following the Kendal flyover we soon arrived on a ledge, just above the bottom of Lost Pot Aven. Here the hoespipe split into two, one branch continuing down while the other headed into the Tate Galleries.

With hazily remembered directions we followed the pipe into the galleries, looking for Epilglottis Grotto. Knowing we had to turn right at some point we found ourselves traversing along the classically shaped and named Cresta run which eventually brought us to a handlined descent. Not remembering this from the description we turned around back to the last junction [having read the description since this handlined descent is the way on to Lyle cavern in Lost Johns'].

Going the "other way" we soon arrived at a pitch, which again we couldn't remember from the description [Crowbar pitch]. Just before this however was a small hole which Dick pointed out looked incredibly like an epiglottis. Sure enough a brief squirm lead to the fine Epiglottis Grotto.

We finally had a look at another dug passage [Venus or Serena??] before returning to the ledge and making the final descent to the bottom of Lost Pot Aven and yet another dig [Wet dig?]. There was a considerable about of water making its way down the climbs leading to the Tube so exploration of this was left for another time. It's not often that my lamp doesn't illuminate the majority of a pitch in Britain, but standing at the bottom of Boxhead's main pitch, the light was just swallowed, it really is an amazing place.

The return journey up the pitches became damper and damper, with water now flowing out of the footholes in the plastic pipe. I waited in here out of the wind and rain on the surface until Dick joined me and with the wind on our backs we once again found the wall that borders the road and with it the way on to the vans.

The Craven Heifer's quiz was in full swing when we arrived and it has to be said that the beer they're serving at the moment is very good and well worth a visit.

23rd December 2011 - bis Ihre Brustwarzen in kaltem Wasser

Mince pies and brandy at Groundsheet Junction

Lee's mellowing with age and he no longer needs pitches of Titanlike proportion to fly over from Germany to go caving with us. Thus we found ourselves on Leck fell with three bags of rope and a pile of maillons for a trip into Lost Johns'.

Despite it's accessability I realised recently that I'd never been to the bottom of the pitches, trips over the years having involved different exchanges but never going further than the cross over points, well above the master cave.

Water levels as we drove up the Lune valley were high and the entrance series was definitely "active". While traversing the first big hole in the floor of the entrance passage felt a little airy it at least separated us from the water and we found ourselves in near silence. Near silence in that while the noise of the water had abated, we were left with a low frequency, almost subsonic, ominous, beating rumble.

At the first short pitch, Dick was at once in his element. While my maillon tightening and knot tying speed are best measured on the same time scale as cave development, Dick fluently passed bolts, leaving a thin yellow line in his wake. All the more impressive considering a later, over a pint admission, that without his glasses, it's all done by feel!

I was looking forward to the Battleaxe traverse and wasn't disappointed. Back and footing along the top of the meandering rift, with occasional glances of the stream far below really is impressive and the Valhalla pitch at the end of it is no anticlimax. Reaquainted with the stream in the form of a fine waterfall, the volume of the cave once again increased and we headed quickly for the final pitch.

Here we found ourselves having to traverse above the p-hangered route down in the maelstrom, a couple of older Petzl bolts providing the security that then allowed us to rejoin the normal route a little further along the streamway.

A short section of meandering stream then finally brought us to the master cave at Groundsheet Junction. A stomp down railway tunnel size passageway always feels the right thing to do after so much verticality and we headed downstream. As Lee pointed out, 10 minutes of walking along a stream like this would soon cement where the deeper parts of a stream are found at bends for any budding GCSE geographer.

The water level slowly increased and the roof level slowly decreased until I began to fear for my car keys which don't like cold water. Dick and Lee looked almost disappointed at this and only reluctently turned around. Walking up stream is definitely harder than walking down, but mince pies and brandy set us up nicely for the return up the pitches.

Lee discovered that it's also much easier to prussik up pitches if you leave behind rope filled tackle sacks for the poor sod behind you!

Would you like a hand with carrying that rope?


Actually it's easier without it.

25th November 2011 - Descent Part III

So technically it should be part II, given that this was only our second trip to the abandoned copper mine workings above Coniston, but someone's already used the name for a high concept film exploring the human condition using a caving trip as a metaphor for a search into the parts of our psyche usually deeply hidden in the shadows, oh and it has monsters and lycra clad, ice axe brandishing girls in it too.

While we didn't actually see any monsters, something had definitely been knawing at the rope leading deeper into one of the veins. At least it was anchored to a bomb proof railway line.

Though the vastness of some of the stopes on the Hospital level gave witness to the riches that had been found in these hillsides, lengthy tunnels to nowhere reminded us of the days and weeks of hopefull toil, following a thin, mineral vein that yeilded no viable reserves of ore.

Reading Paul in awe of the ore.

Emerging into a wild night it was off to sample the wares of the Black Bull, a great pub with the further advantage of it's own en suite brewery. Fortunately they also do carryout, so after a pint we could relocate to our campsite for the night at Tilberthwaite.

The Met office warning of high winds and torrential rain had the softer members of the TNC scurrying home to write blogs, while those hardened to the elements set off with Reading Paul for a day's mountain biking at Whinlatter.

18th November 2011 - Miss Marple Investigates

Given that the season has only just begun, alibis seem to be arriving ever earlier in the week.
John's arrived on Wednesday, which allowed ample time for the alibi to be fully investigated. incredibly it appears to have been genuine, or John has set up a call and e-mail response centre solely to back up his excuses.
Phil's arrived on the night in the form of a doctors note, but Tom left his 'til the very last minute with the classic quote, "I think I've left my SRT gear at home." Unfortunately he'd forgotten to clear a spare pulley jammer, assorted krabs and all the old bits of tat out of his bag. Thus a few minutes later he was fully equiped and ready to go.
Dick was keen to be rigging again and set off down the pitches with a 10 out of 10 for his skills and a massive improvement on my efforts a fortnight earlier (given 5/10 and more tellingly re-rigged by Tom before he set off down).
As with reaching a summit on a mountain, it's always nice to reach a sump in a cave and even better if there are two. The dive lines disappearing into the murk a testament to divers being a different breed.

A few pretties completed the trip before Tom ably filled in for John by declaring in a headmasterly tone that it was time for the pub.

Grotte Du Guiers Vif, Chartreuse. Friday 11th November

Les horloges ont repris, après la mi-Octobre a passé (nous avions un bon moment à Swanage) et une semaine a passé depuis ce qui pourrait / devrait / aurait dû être le TNC première compétition de la saison 2011/2012. Mais ... après une semaine sans blog a été prochain afin de l'hypothèse doit être faite que la saison n'a pas réellement commencé et a donc été laissé au membre de l'équipe voyageant en association avec le CSFdTNC (fédérée août 2007) (Club Français de Spelologie Jeudi Nuit Club) branche à la clandestinité et le blog du voyage réclamant ainsi le premier voyage de la saison.

En France la spéléologie n'est pas seulement une courte distance de marche de la voiture, mais une expédition d'alpinisme suivie par la grotte avec une descente Via Ferrata à la voiture. La promenade jusqu'à la grotte a commencé avec une équipe de 4 le plan en cours pour deux de la partie pour visiter la ville aux cascades et ensuite travailler leur chemin de retour vers le bar. Les deux autres (Dick et David) porterait sur la montagne escarpée jusqu'à la grotte, puis descendre explorer cette cascade de la route de retour à la barre a aidé par la bien équipé par des équipements ferratta. L'autre chose à propos de spéléologie En France était qu'il n'y avait aucun besoin de poids des vêtements, oversuits, bottes en caoutchouc et des casques. Les larges passages, marche facile et sec grotte chaude répondant aux critères pour un 'voyage de moelleux 'avait pas été pour l'ascension et la descente de montagne alpine.

Une fois trouvé (il ya de nombreux détournements sur le trajet ascendant de la montagne) l'entrée de la grotte fit signe d'approcher l'autre côté du couloir d'entrée très vaste. L'eau de la grotte émergents cinquante mètres en dessous de la série d'entrée fossilisés dans le visage du cirque. Exploration des passages important dans la grotte nous a conduit via un arbre de 80m avec de l'eau d'entrer, vers le puisard où les photos ont été prises et la sortie a été effectuée par une autre voie de passage fascinant dépôts stratifiés retourner vers l'entrée.

La descente pour revenir à la barre a commencé par une ruée vers le bas d'une ravine en passant sous une arche de comparaître à la résurgence, qui est tombé sur une chute d'eau pour les rochers en contrebas. Câbles étaient en place pour protéger la montée à travers les rochers au fond de la cascade, où plus de photos ont été prises. 

Quelques éboulis opérationnel rapidement conduit à la cascade suivante où le brouillage a conduit à la piste touristique et un sprint rapide retour vers le bar où les membres des équipes d'autres (Sharon et Christine) attendaient avec de la bière prête.

21st August 2011 - A lesson in determination

July's visit to the Cupcake had taken place on a blue sky day with temperatures nudging into the mid twenties leading to accusations of madness from some members of the TNC. Luckily for Tom as another blue sky day dawned and the thermometer this time headed towards 30, he was on a plane to Spain and therefore had a watertight alibi for not caving. Two years ago while enjoying the Mackrill's superb hospitality on the Vercors plateau, Paul had taken us to visit his dig which at the time had reached -23m and was beginning to make its way into the side of a boulder choke. Now it was time to see what progress had been made in the intervening years.

Even though much of the walk to the dig is tree covered, it was still hot. Fortunately my PVC suit was hung up at home as even in shorts and a T-shirt I'd soon worked up a sweat. Arriving at the dig, the plants round the base of the covering tent trembled in a chilling breeze eminating from the entrance. I've often read of cave discoveries being made by the witnessing of twitching vegetation on still days, but this was the first time I'd seen such a strong draught.

Making our way down the initial climb the draught continued blowing up my trouser legs and sleeves. We soon arrived at the previous deep point and were greeted by a beautifully cast concrete lintel, where once there had just been boulders. Beneath the lintel the way on lay open and the passage led around the corner into an open rift, leading both up and down. The pullies above and spoil filled cavities acted as reminders that even though this rift appeared open now, a lot of work had gone into making it so. Our work for the day was to install a number of stempel steps in the lower part of the rift, to allow easier access to the digging "face" and also to see if we could make any further progress. Paul swiftly installed the new steps with an efficiency born of years of experience and it was soon time to try making his dig a little deeper.

Paul demonstrated his technique for capping, highlighting the importance of each step in the preparation process and the need to be methodical. A dull thud then took off a large chunk of rock at the bottom of the rift. Paul systematically prepared a new hole, before it was my go. This time the dull thud was accompanied by the tinkling sound of the firing screwdriver dropping down into the boulders below, a little more practice is required. Having loosened a fair bit of rock it was now time to shift it up the shaft and store it in a large alcove. I was quickly reintroduced to the hauling system that I last remember being employed to take material to the surface, unfortunately all my triathlon training had left me at lithe race weight (I wish) and Paul had to send up half loads to prevent my dangling ineffectually in the air. After a good few bucket loads we'd lowered the dig by nearly a metre with a draught and beckoning blackness that would excite even the most pessimistic of diggers. Huge thanks to Paul once again for the superb hospitality, the capping lesson and another look down his dig.