Weather was increasingly horrid over the weekend; lovely to get underground - where it's always 15 degrees & it never rains!
Stonking Trips: Swinsto, Valley Ent, Jingling, Rumbling, Notts II & Lancaster Hole all powered by some serious curry action on the Saturday night, boosted by great speleo balderdash around the coal fire of the NPC in the evenings.

Back from the Yorks winter tour, just in time for Crimbo!
Highlight was a great exchange trip down Lost Johns' (Centipede / Dome), with Tuetonic duets while we waited to enjoy the lovely rigging and amazing pitches. Other caves include Aquamole, Rowten, County (to Holbeck Jnct), Lancaster (to Waterfall Chamber), Yordas Pot and Jingling.
A few lucky boys and girls got to stay up in Yorks over Christmas, whereupon they found themselves in the middle of a Christmas Day rescue!
Read all about it in the 5000 word epic of a report...

Hail, rain and gales couldn't keep us above ground. The main Saturday trips were down JH (slightly shorter sister cave to Titan) and Maskhill/Oxlowe, with a novice trip down Giants. Obscene amounts of Chilli eaten that evening to replace the lost calories...

And the rain came down!
Atrocious weather, but with a triple-trip down OFD to generally get lost, stumble upon some amazing formations, then bimble out again. Rik lead his way to have a peer at the streamway, swollen to impassable levels by vast quantities of water. Sandeep found a mud chamber filled with elegant subterranean sculptures, some of which were even suitable for minors. Hungarian dish for supper in front of the wood stove at the hut, followed by a jam session of the all new caving Jazz Trio (Guitar, Violin & Viola!). Sunday was similarly wet; exploration of some (dry) silicate mines once located in a rather large wilderness.

A huge trip this weekend, with 19 people underground on Saturday and two slap up curries afterwards. Sunday was an Easegill bonanza with three parallel trips.
The evolution of underground food has gone from chocolate to malt loaf and Christmas pudding to chocolate pudding, a definite improvement.

"Bring back. Bring back. Oh.. Bring back my ladder to me..."

A slide show cum cheese and wine night will be in the prayer room in Beit East basement from 8pm.

Come for the stories of exotic places we been to over the years on tours. Come for the tales of kilometres of newly discovered cave passage. Come for the free cheese and wine, we don't care, just come and have a look at our cool photos.

We'll also be showing the Planet Earth episode about caves, you ready to be awed?

The first trip of the year proved to be a stunning success, 9 freshers down two different caves, enjoying the varied environments possible underground.
Saturday night ended in a super-duper game of Presidents & Arseholes in the pub.

Dave Loeffler's report of Hidden Earth (BCRA) 2006 in Leek.

While most people in the caving club did something sensible this summer, such as caving, or caravan'ing in Hull, Tetley & Jarv decided to go for a jaunt around the Atlantic in a stupidly small 26 foot sailboat. And after having survived the crossings, fought with the dolphins & endured each other's fine company in a telephone-box sized living space, what did they do at the paradise islands they visited?

Why, they went underground of course!