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Yorkshire Winter Tour

Photos to follow (maybe)

Ben Richards, Dave Wilson, David Wilson, James Wilson, Ellie Pizey, Chris Hayes, Julien Jean, Jergus Strucka, Thurston Blount, Jackie Li, Thomas Pearson, Kai Vice, Zelu Xu

Friday

With ambitious plans to bring everything with us, we very slowly loaded the car. It got to the point at 6pm where Julien was still faffing around, so I just said "alright let's get everything to the car now please". Thomas had just arrived and actually listened. So, the car kept getting fuller and fuller. It got to the point where we had about 6 bags on the road and some other random things, and just told Thomas that we weren't sure he'd fit. He then proceeded to get in the car and told us to keep piling stuff on top of him. As he had not been to a Yorkshire trip before, we weren't really sure if he knew the ride ahead of him, so told him no and bought him a train ticket. Sadly, he obliged, and the car completely filled up.

Just Julien and I left. We talked the entire way up to Yorkshire. Last weeks antics were interesting.

Thurston

Thomas and i bascially missed our train. whoopsie! We got in to Birmingham (ew) to get picketed upped by Chris, much appreciated. We had to go to TWO whole rest stops, neither of which had ANY good food :(.

KAI: my first report (I wrote the mendips one after this)

Saturday

Curtain Pot: Ellie Pizey, Julien Jean, Jergus Strucka, Jackie Li

Useful info: It didn't rain prior to Saturday, but the ground was really quite saturated. The walk to Curtain pot is approximately 45 min long; it is a nice path for about 30 minutes, then uphill for 15 minutes. The entrance is in the side of a steep shakehole, there is an uneccesary but easy to see stake at the top of the shakehole. The entry to the hole is not-obvious from the top, as it is a sideways slide onto a pitch. There are resin anchors within the mossy wall directly opposite of the entrance. They are really quite hard to locate, but they are really beneath the moss.

Initially, the cave is horribly loose with a massive tarpaulin hanging down the pitch. Once you pass this, the cave is pretty, has a lot of short-ish and easy pitches, crawls, free climbs, and good vibes. It is also made of solid rock, has walking passages, I think a pretty perfect cave.

Non-useful info: For some reason, someone installed a pipe that collects water from the bottom og the tarpaulin pitch and hurls it straight onto the follow-up pitch. Not the greatest feat of engineering.

I rigged the sixth pitch off an awkward pancaked spit in the wall - the rigging was not always obvious to me, with a weird combination of spits, expansion bolts, threads, and bomber resin anchors.

Jergus

County: Chris Hayes, Thurston Blount, Thomas Pearson, Kai Vice, Zelu Xu

Easegill. Of course Chris wants to go to f'ing Easegill. After heading to bed pretty early the previous night, I woke up at the decently early hour of 7am to wait for the ASDA van. Still dark out. Lie on the sofa and wait for the lights to appear. Here they are! I literally jumped out of the sofa and ran over to the poor man whilst he was still parking. Too eager. At least all the doors stay open so its easy to carry all the stuff through. Box after box. What on earth was I thinking when I bought all this stuff?? Still not actually finished with eating despite being Thursday night.

Insert picture of the food shop on the floor here. Sorry.

Anyways, large plans of Boxhead to Notts II were crushed by the hand of the weather over the previous week... many many millimetres of rain. Sad. Another day this will happen. After a good breakfast of fry up, the next thing to do was actually determine which cave we were going to do. As we had a new member who hadn't caved before, Chris decided that Jergus should go and teach them SRT whilst we all wait around and eat the rest of breakfast. He also decided that county would be a brilliant cave to go to.

Well, eventually we all set off in mine and Chris' car, eventually ending up at the RRCPC after passing by so many cars? I think I passed at least 20 just on the road next to the red rose. Weird. Quickly changing, Thomas was very eager to leave (as always), despite not even being fully changed? Very baffling. The walk to county was boggy as ever, though at least the sky was pretty. Love the wind turbines too - they always make me think of how much I love the countryside. I mean, whenever I think of a wind turbine I think of the outdoors and that just makes me value them so much, you know? I just think they add to a landscape. Maybe it's something to do with the fact that back when I had geography lessons all those years ago and looked out the window of the classroom (at the top of a hill in Cornwall, so so far away from here), that I could just see those wind turbines. I mean, there was always the fact that Mrs. Wormald told us that if the wind turbines were spinning, and you can see a train on the viaduct, a plane in the sky, and a double rainbow, then the lesson would just end. Maybe it could be something to do with the fact that there was always green energy lessons, even in physics! I remember this one time that we were challenged to provide power for the whole Mylor area and give a presentation on why it would be the cheapest way. Now, whilst many other people decided that either offshore wind was worth the massive expense, or that onshore wind + solar panels were the best, my group decided differently. See, we thought, hm these biofuel engines are pretty cheap, maybe we could do something with those. So, we decided the best thing to do was to add a few hydroelectric dams to create some reservoirs (and energy), and turn the entirety of the area into farmland. I mean, this was a good idea, though the problem was the large town of Falmouth in the way... Our solution? Turn them all into biofuel. I mean, it was a cheap solution and reduced the energy demand, but probably a little dark for a physics presentation. Anyway, we presented it still and actually won the most creative solution (unsurprisingly). I also think it did end up being the cheapest, though was a little too unfeasible to actually win that sadly. Despite this, I still think of this every time I see a wind turbine. I also remember this one time that I went on a Geology field trip to Bude just after Covid. Now, it was actually a good trip! Saw some good chevron folding and a massive fault on Bude beach. It also happens that there are massive folded symmetrical ripple marks from when Bude was a massive lake many millions of years ago. Anyway, after leaving the beach, the minibus we were in was forced up this massive hill, and we all had to get out and push. This was quite funny, but this may have f'ed up the engine a little bit, or at least enough to just about destroy something. Anyway, going back along the A38, we eventually had to pull over and call AA, as something was broken. I mean I was just a measly Sixth Form student at the time, so I had no cares or desire to help much, so just led a few people over to the wind turbine in the field next to where we had stopped. This was great! I had never been so close to a wind turbine, and this was the first time I realised how impressive they actually are. The loud whoosh as the arms rotate past, the speed at which they move, and even just the massive size of them. They are incredible feats of engineering. God I could just keep going on about this. Anyway. Love a good wind turbine.

Getting to County was easy, I mean the walk is just a bit long, but it's not that bad anymore, especially after Slov. It's literally the first cave in the upper easegill streamway. TBH, most of the cave was pretty easy, you go in, do a bit of crawling, then some other things, get to the first pitch, do another pitch a little later, both of which are nice to rig, then do an awful climb. I mean, please bring at least a sling, if not a rope next time. Tbf, I would just recommend taking the upper traverse on the way back anyway. The climb is just annoying. I just "jumped" down (lowered and dropped when I couldn't find good foot holds). I had let Thomas go down, and he just seemed to run off down every little passage, before eventually returning and telling me all about it. Great fun.

Go past showerbath chamber, eventually do some muddy stuff. Go past the wretched rabbit turn off at some point past some rifts. See where the rift had flooded to the roof (exciting), then reach the main river. We decided to actually try and go to stop pot, though this proved challenging, as we were really adamant about going through the sluice rather than anything else, and as the wet person, I decided that I would just do it. On the way there was fine, though wet, but on the way back (after everyone said no to doing it themselves), I got minorly wedged for about 5 seconds, where the water started rising up my face, which was quite the excitement for a Saturday midday.

Out of the sluice, we stopped to take some photos, where I decided that because I was already wet, I would just lie down in the river and let Thomas pretend to drown me. Pretty fun. Got brainfreeze about 4 times though (Unsurprisingly). The way back out was pretty simple. Some memorable moments include making Zelu do an "Edward's Shortcut-style traverse", which was a lot worse than just giving her a boost up the climb (though I wasn't even sure if I would make it myself up the climb); I also had a brief sharp encounter with a stake up the pitch straight after the awkward climb. Getting to the top of the pitch, I threw my leg over the nearest rock to try and sit up before taking my SRT kit off, but being too fat to even see what was attached to the rock, I just threw my calf straight on an iron stake. At least I'm not a vampire or whatever. That hurt. I just yelped in pain and tried to brush it off.

The rest of the trip went pretty smoothly, with Chris derigging. After we left, Thomas got really cold and decided to walk back to the car himself. I just kind of hoped that he made it back, because I didn't want to have to deal with him getting lost, just like Laura.

Thurston

roughly 5 hour cave, if my watch is correct ? I don't remember anything. but like i think it was fun (I ended up caving the next day. lol) I do remember outside the cave however. and let it be known that (on the way back), Thurston was the one who rugby tackled me first. and it does in fact count as a tackle if I go down as well.

Kai, no memory :(

Sunday

Shuttleworth Pot: Chris Hayes, Thurston Blount, Thomas Pearson, Kai Vice

the actual cave was quite short. So many pretties!!! Chris takes better photos than Ben. (at least this one time). To be honest I was quite surprised at how short it was, though it was still very fun. The cave itself was quite easy, I think? again, bad memory (this is a three day retrospective trip report).

Chris, after having regaled us with tales the previous night of how he'd gotten trapped on the other side of the sump once, was keen to move away from the sump, but I was entranced by the promise of a growling sump. I was not disapponited with the result: the sump gurgled, which sounded like a small dog's growl. However, before my brain had even recognised the gurgle, the most pure, innocent, heavenly scream emitted from his mouth. Pure, unadulterated fear apparently.

Once we got back to the NPC, we ended up making Christmas dinner, which was quite enjoyable. The 1000 versions of Last Christmas still haunt my dreams. I ended up dying Thurston's hair purple, and he now has a very purple neck. The table traverse also happned at some point, and Thomas managed to get it on the first try — after seeing his antics in Mendips I'm not surprised.

Kai, professional hair dyer

Pretty cave, can't complain about seeing straws and a whirlpooly sump.

Thurston

Sell Gill: Ellie Pizey, Julien Jean, Jergus Strucka, Jackie Li, Zelu Xu

Useful info: Sell Gill appears to be the perfect Sunday cave for SRT on very wet days, at least the dry route. It was fairly wet weather (see Aquamole trip report lower), and the pitches following the dry route were completely dry. The SRT is not complicated, but the re-belays do not have very conveniently positioned ledges, so it's required to pull yourself up to remove croll. On dry days, there is quite cute passage at the bottom of the cave. Following it will lead to good soaking I presume, but the little that I could see looked pretty.

Looking at the Wet (Goblin) route from the bottom, it looked quite wet. I'd recommend to evade if it isn't dry weather.

Non-useful info: As we made it to the parking spot, Julien proclaimed "Oh no", he has forgotten his croll. Fortunately, he carries a spare handjammer... Shortly afterwards, Ellie proclaimed "Oh no", she has forgotten her chest harness. Fortunately, she carries a spare sling... Julien rigged at an OK pace, Jackie derigged fabulously, Ellie showed her incredible skill in teaching SRT, and Zelu conquered her vertical fear. All went well.

Jergus

Monday

Lost Johns': Ben Richards, Thurston Blount, Thomas Pearson, Kai Vice, Zelu Xu

Appreciation for the fact the cave was basically at the carpark; the past few days have had ridiculously long treks to the cave entrance. Which were good for shenanigans. not so good for caving.

basically got hypothermia (if it occurs above 14°C). BUT we made it down to VALHALLA (include a scream while reading this), after an interestingly polished traverse (battle axe). I got really cold on the way up but we (Ben, Zelu and I) made it up before Thurston and Thomas. I (phenomenal as usual) was the only one who did an exchange (due to the hypothermia aka Kai got wet because the furry did not, in fact, zip up), going down Dome and Cathedral, then coming up Centipede. prussiking is still a pain sadly. Up 45 meters with a 10,000kg tackle sack (jk it was 10kg) and forgot about it until halfway up. started wondering why i wasn't going up so (obviously) looked down, and saw some weird thing hanging off my hip. It was in fact, the tackle sack. Anyway, Chris was very smart with telling us to put electrical wire around or fenixes because mine fell off the helmet, and would have fallen into the very rapid currents below. Valhalla was very cool. i was spinning a lot. if i can be bothered to come back to this report there might be some photos ? but we'll see...

It's by far my favourite cave: not too many crazy squeezes, only a couple parts where I thought I was going to die (that was an interesting bridging session over the top of Cathedral) and only seventeen bruises acquired (lack of kneepads). I got to do my first bit of rigging!

Outside of the cave, Ben found a fenix. It's mine now. Also, leaving the cave, I thought it would be a good idea to launch myself, belly first, onto a flat rock. Which would be a brilliant idea, had there not been a lot of SRT kit with loops in it. I now live (?) to tell the tale with two long bruises.

Kai (recently dead)

My first time rigging battleass. Previously, when I was with mr Jan himself, I had found a convenient place to take a nap on the traverse. Unfortunately, it was me doing the rigging this time. You could not hear a thing sadly, but it was probably for the best, as Last Christmas was on repeat from the cave phone, driving Thomas mad. Battleass was a bit easier than expected, and I mostly just wedged my Tibia and Fibula into a rift repeatedly.

Right at the beginning, I thought fuck it, lets give Thomas and Kai a go at rigging. So, for both the first 10 metres, they did just that. It was pretty easy to watch, just peering at them as they go and give them a tonne of shitty advice. They made it and we all survived. That's what counts.

I sat at the bottom of valhalla for approximately 1.25 hours, as I was the first and last there. I both rigged and derigged it, much to my delight, and had to carry our new Union Mandated Tacklesack out of the cave. Tbh, battleass is easier backwards rather than forwards, as you just clip in and undo stuff. No sitting in a rift worrying about the fact you are slowly sliding. Candle and Shistol is a weird one. Not just from the fact it sounds like someone was playing cluedo when they came up with the name, but also that just the CNCC topo makes no fucking sense. Like ffs there is nothing correct on that topo except for possibly the first bolt. I mean, the rope length was completely off anyway. Whatever. It got done. Part of Shistol was a wet handline that very much was just a waterfall on your legs. Pretty fun.

Kai was a bit cold, so Ben and I debated which group Kai should go back on, and decided that Kai should go up centipede. This then meant that Thomas and I were taking 3 bags total. Now, how would I try and get myself out of that. It actually ended up being pretty easy! I asked Thomas if he would like to derig Dome Junction, to which he hurriedly agreed to, and took the Union Mandated Tacklesack off me. I decided that I would derig Dome, just because the deviation is quite awkward, and I didn't think it was useful on a first derigging trip. I mean, I struggled with getting it off, just because it is awkward. After this, Thomas decided to just keep the Union Mandated Tacklesack the rest of the way, except for the part where he derigged Cathedral, Vestry, and the 2 10m pitches, after which we swapped, and he took two bags?? for no reason. And I just took the orange bag that shall not be named.

Halfway through the entrance stream was the chockstone in the rift, where I initially threw my bag over (to which it just floated back), and then eventually just placed it on the stone. As I turned back, I saw Thomas' light flickering intensely, so turned it off for him, guiding him out the rest of the cave with just my torch. Overall, a very fun trip, with the highest water level I have seen in Lost Johns'.

Thurston

Aquamole + Jingling: James Wilson, Jergus Strucka

Useful info: The week prior to our trip it rained quite hard; Bull Pot farm measured 13.2 mm on Dec 4th, 33.8 mm on Dec 5th, 39.1 mm on Dec 6th, 22.4 mm on Dec 7th, and 16.8 mm on Dec 8th. This was followed by a week of relatively dry weather, but the Kingsdale Beck seemed quite high and everything was soaked. Day before our trip it rained 18.8 mm (Dec 14th) and it was yellow warning on Dec 15th the day of our trip (eventually, it rained 29 mm).

The first 50 m pitch was completely fine, the 30 m pitch following that was quite wet, nothing that could not be passed with a PVC both down and up. From the moment of entering the cave, it sounded quite wet. The yellow warning for flooding in Yorkshire made us cautious, but if it wasn't scheduled to rain heavily later in the day, it'd be fine to go further down.

SRT wise, it's a rifty cave with many re-belays. It is quite possible to see what a person is doing ahead of you because of the goemetry, but it wouldn't be very easy to be close to a fresher. I'd still say that it looks like a viable fresher trip.

Non-useful info: James and I agreed to head to Aquamole, because I have never been there before, and was quite keen to see the sump. Abseiling down the initial shaft it became clear that the cave was pre-rigged on fairly nice rope. We abseiled down the 50m pitch and saw the upcoming 30m Y-hang directly in a heavy shower. After some attempts to use our tackle sack as a way to divert the shower away from the pitch, neither James nor I were convinced...

Five minutes of chat in front of the shower pitch and we were both prussiking back out; instead heading to Jingling, where James rigged down while I talked a lot. On our way out, we met up with the Bull Pot team standing at the top of Jingling. Unfortunately, I had just finished de-rigging. We handed DW the rope bag with a single 80m conveniently pre-tied and pre-mailloned rope, which could reach all the way to the bottom and left. They, unconveniently, decided to undo the knots and maillons to re-do them again on the way down. Heresy.

Jergus

Bull Pot + Jingling: Dave Wilson, Ellie Pizey, Julien Jean, Jackie Li

Tuesday

Some editing and some studying, until ... Walk!! Basically up to Gaping Gill (but not all the way) Ben was very helpful with photo editing stuff. (Chris is going to lose our editing competition. btw.) Thomas fell asleep again, nap counter: 5 (today)

I was told to add:

I made some scones. Yum. Sandwiches. All whilst Ben was doing some work making the shelves for the platters. I eventually got a call telling me to pick people up from inglesborough cave, though upon arrival, I realised that they were a half-hour walk away from a sign saying "authorised access only", so I gave up and drove home to do some work. Upon my return to Clapham, I decided to kidnap the walkers and take them to inglesport, where we wandered mindlessly. We then went to the petrol station to grab some food or something, before heading back home, just 5 minutes before Ben finished his contraption.

I did so much work. Feel free to look at my poster.

Thurston

Wednesday

Lancaster Hole: Ben Richards, Dave Wilson, Julien Jean, Thurston Blount, Jackie Li, Thomas Pearson, Kai Vice

"Dry cave" MY ASS. I have not had a SINGLE dry cave this ENTIRE BLOODY TRIP. I was told today is the driest one yet. SO WHY WAS MY FURRY THE WETTEST IT'S BEEN ALL WEEK?????? Other than the LIES spouted by the people here (entirely committee or alumni, who are we entrusting ourselves to?), who are all CHRONIC LIARS, the cave was very very nice. I only got six new bruises, as opposed to the seventeen from the last trip (knee pads were not forgotten today!).

To be honest, the cave was mostly dry, and courtesy of Dave (DW) I had another set of gloves that kept my hands dry. until the sweat condensed, at least. Some of the in situ stuff was sketchy, especially for someone who's shorter. However! due to my phenomenal skill called "being scared as fuck of heights," I managed to wrangle my way up and down some things that really should have been pitches. There was only a small scream when I free fell (my ass slid off the rock I was sitting on) 100 meters (literally not even a single meter was fallen. maybe like half a meter).

There was so much mud. It was also quite slippy, which, as per usual, I am terrified of. Especially when there are very large holes that I could definitely fit down. I took some cave naps (finally! naps!!!) because of a distinct lack of sleep this entire week, and got to see some pretties, as well as have some photos taken by Ben. I now see why his photography trips are so polarising.

On the way out, there was a concerningly cold draft, and once I approached the exit, I was quite surprised to see the two drips of water that happened on the way down had genuinely turned into a mini waterfall. Prussiking up that was an experience. I had to hold my glasses in my mouth because they were either fogged up from my sweat, or covered in the constant barrage of water from the heavens (the surface).

Kai; status: soggy

Slug world. Fucking... fucking... fucking... fuck. Good water though. Pleased to see some good things. Took some photos where I just positioned Ben's flashes like the slave I am and played chess against a bot behind a bit of flowstone. I took a lot of selfies.

Thurston

Thursday

Day off for me sadly, just constantly doing poster work after poster work... even now on Christmas Day :/ Well, hopefully it goes well, sadly I was just told yesterday that the whole thing is the wrong orientation. Whoops. Report takes priority for now though.

With the piles of washing up left from the previous days, our lord and saviour Davey arrived to help. Warded away by tales of off cheese, this man spent 4 hours or so cleaning the kitchen. What a hero.

Thurston

Friday

Crescent

A recommendation from the dubz, we decided the long walk to crescent was apparently "worth it" just to see the "incredible crescent shaped passage" and "impressive gabions". Parking the car and getting changed (chocolate wrappers flying everywhere) was quick, and we set off towards the farm. Here, we were greeted by a lovely little dog who guided us to the front door, where I quickly informed the farmer we would be crossing his land (very friendly people).

Up we go. Steep hill. Through the forest, hop some dry stone walls, up the steep hill again. At the top, an incredible view awaited of the entirety of Kingsdale. That at least made the walk worth it. Anyway, onwards to crescent. Luckily, as we had a GPS and it wasn't a blizzard, the way to crescent was quick and easy on the plateau.

Insert photo of Julien and Kai looking out at Kingsdale pleaseee

Inside the shakehole was another matter, however. I had no clue if it was just an endless pit and slowly lowered myself down, clearing moss as I went. Turns out it is just a shallow hole. In the deepest end is the entrance with a single bolt, which to my knowledge is just the start (a single hang), though a natural can be precariously used from the underside of the overhang in the middle of the shakehole (to the left as you look backwards from the pitch). The rigging wasn't too bad, but the bolts could be a lot better (lots of rubbing). The first pitch was just a little tight, but nothing too bad, so with two bags dangling from my harness, I set off to see the crescent passage.

Turns out it is about 3 metres across, 1 metre wide. Not really impressive. Just looked more like a deep streamway. You can see better in most other caves really... At the bottom, a short "squeeze" through a rift lands at the top of the previous 3rd pitch, now a bunch of small climbs down gabions (these are roughly between 1.5-2m tall each, with ~3-4 taking you down to a nice ledge, and ~3-4 more taking you down to a narrow entryway into the final chamber before the flat-out crawls. We decided not to go further, as apparently it is just miserable with no real goal. Classic East Kingsdale, so I hear.

From here, I waited for Julien and Kai, pointed them down the hole, took some photos of us on the gabions and a small frog situated in a bone, before leaving. Sadly it was me who was derigging, so once out I just said f it and took both bags. Really quite a short cave if you do none of the horrible stuff. Is it worth it? The cave, no, but the view, yes. We actually managed to get out for golden hour, which was very lovely to see.

Skipping and sliding down the hill, we eventually hit the bridge to the farm, where I attempted to slide through the tubes. Not as powerful as I was hoping for, but the water on the downstream side was a lot deeper than I expected. Good through-trip.

Thurston

Valley Entrance

One of my favourite caves in wet weather, so we of course had to go. I was excited to see if the stream was as high as last year (when Julien, Remi, Jan, and I took Lamya to get washed down the sump). Going in, the water was high, which was good to see, with the crawls getting unavoidably wet. Yippee. The way on is easy now, though I think this may now be my most caved cave with the club (though unofficially Swildons may be competing). Getting to the stream, we let Kai rig the pitch and descending. The stream sadly wasn't as high as previous times, but at least the sump was frothy.

Quick bimble up the stream and slow float back. I have to derig again... Run out the cave, back to the car. Easy, fun trip. Very wet. Probably passable from Swinsto/Swildons, though I didn't want to leave the other two behind, so turned around before reaching the junction. Would be very fun.

What a fun Winter Tour.

Thurston