Trips & Reports

Usually known for my phobia of inefficiency, I really enjoyed the trip despite copious amounts of faff at various points! Just goes to show that it's largely the group that make a great trip :) Having read a fair bit about Small Mammal Pot, it was nice to finally descend it & it was good to do a bit of rigging again too. Much muddier that I'd expected though, although it is another all-weather route & sections could be mixed... read more

Quite a faffy trip, but fun nevertheless. Small Mammal Pot is a good alternative to the standard Bar Pot descent. Be warned though, it is more than a bit muddy (as the rest of the team could verify by the state of my face and oversuit at the end of the day!) and not ideal for "larger" people - quite a bit of squeezing and contortionism were required in places. I dont think Matt enjoyed going through the keyhole at... read more

After a few beers, Kev made me think that it would be a good idea to go for a potter about in Peak Cavern at the weekend. This was to be the first time Nikki and Gover had been caving in a long while and so it was intended to be a slow wander around some stompy passages... We headed down to the TSG making good time, and sat about chatting while we made a monster breakfast. A few cups of... read more

Thankfully this week at least one member of the team had a clue where the cave was, it seemed that the previous week we just didn’t go far enough down the field, after getting very confused by another fenced off section. This was the de-rigging trip! After the late time getting back from the trip the previous day I was rather glad to be at Bernie’s having a hearty breakfast. There is a choice of about three holes to take within... read more

Change 2 only for midges. In other news: Awesome rating 5/5 Man rating 4/5 Near death rating 3/5

Awesome rating 5/5 Man rating - not sure what this meens Near death rating 5/5, but only because I was cloth-lined by a rope from another club when one of them swung out across the bridge

I’m not very good at writing trip reports as I can never remember what came where regarding routes. So instead I’m gona take a different approach and explain why I voted the way I did! Faff; High level of faff on the way due to a road being closed. Luckily I keep a map book in my car and so with the aid of my sat navs (Anna, Josh and Christian) I was instructed to take various exits at roundabouts... read more

A fantastic day out! I was really glad about this after the failure of a trip the week before. Mark had been given an interesting selection of names of those wanting to go caving at training, initially I wanted to go on the Rowten trip as it’s a cave I really wanted to do. Instead I was asked if I would rig and lead a trip down Aquamole pot, I jumped at the opportunity at being able to lead my... read more

High scummyness due to the huge amounts of sweaty flesh while dancing.

It looked a lot smaller from the top than I had expected but it just opened out into a lush green pot. that seemed to grow the further you go down. It was a pretty cool shaft with Jackdaws and a football at the bottom. I went down last after rescuing foolish lambs that watched to jump on Alex whilst he was rigging! The crawl at the bottom was pretty minging and thankfully quite short, but it wasn't as bad as... read more

The plan for the day, as always, was super-efficiency :) With 6 people wanting to go we decided to split into 2 groups of 3 as 6 is never a good number to have in one group. The early bird team (Me, Cat & Andy) aimed to leave at 7:30 (we settled for 8!) whilst Ade, Chuck and Chad were to follow at 9. Our early team were doing well, in Bernies at 10ish in time for our Yorkshire puds, although... read more

What can I say… AMAZING! Dihedral is a truly fantastic descent, and standing on the ledge half way down took my breath away. There was a bit of worry on reaching the entrance that it would be too wet as last time Matt went down it was bone dry whereas today the stream was flowing through. But there was no way we were going to back out now so decided to rig it and have a better look -... read more

Mud Hall is muddy

An amazing trip to a truly unique cave. Team arrived at the container mostly on time. The journey was very efficient, even having time to stop for some breakfast (unfortunately not at Bernies). Lots of fun, some of the passages almost seemed purpose built for sliding down. The multiple routes also allowed for a lot of enjoyment to be had in repeat descents, all of which were completed due to overall good efficiency. The change was also very pleasant, better than any caving trip... read more

It rained so Otter Hole was out so we ended up going down this one. Its a great cave. VERY easy to get lost as there are loads of different promising-looking routes to go down. Our main focus of the trip was to go down the La La slide (yes that is the one next to tubby hall) and also to see the white crystal pool (or something like that). Most of the cave is completely dry, except for a... read more

the day started with the purchase of a blindingly white helmet, note for future referance it was actually white when i got it. we parked up and me and mark got out, while ade and cat were driving round the entire of ingleborough mountain to actually find signal for a callout, me and mark just had a little sunbathe/picture of ingleborough. then it was time to get changed, cat really didn't want to get changed even saying "i don't want to... read more

I started feeling pretty ill derigging the bottom pitch and things got worse on the way up. The bottom of the second pitch was probably the worst point and it was quite a relief to get out in the end. Thanks to the other guys for being so helpful! I hope I don't feel like that again for a good while...

A pretty efficient start – Ade actually turned up on time to pick me up, shock horror! I was anticipating him being late as per usual so ended up having to finish my breakfast in the car… All was going well til we parked up at the foot of Inglebrough and started to get changed. I asked what time call-out had been set for… “Call out, whats that again?” was the response…. So Ade and I hopped back into the... read more

Awsome! Everthing good about Kingsdale in one short cave. An impressive entrance pitch, a wet crawl, a waterfall pitch and a huge chamber, all in 20 minutes!

It was quite nice to be involved in helping out Jim Lister who is working in Ink Sump, which may in the future open up miles of unexplored Peak Cavern caving to all us cavers. We each carried two pieces of Scaffolding through and carried out Oxygen cylinders. We all got wet; we were out in no time to enjoy Castleton sun!

I also carried a 1kg tackle sack of nails, hence extra hard points! We have absolutely no idea what Jim needs that many nails for but it's quite exciting. We think he might be building his own house down there :)

It's going to be a skyscraper! None of these comparisions like "a shaft bigger than St Paul's Cathedral" stuff. It'll be "a shaft containing a full size replica of Blackpool Tower " or something like that! Or, what about a secret underground lair a la Bond Bad Guys? With Monorails and the like? With a Missile Silo! Someone has to build them. Good quick trip though - sorted my awakeness issues. (And what about Blakey appearing from that "sump"!!)

I tell you all you really don't want to see Blakey in a dark ally, never mind coming out of sump!

Feeling sore and unadventurous I was quite glad to get back out into the sun! As for a secret underground lair, could Jim actually be planning world domination?

Epic: adj. Of, constituting, having to do with, or suggestive of a literary epic: an epic poem. Surpassing the usual or ordinary, particularly in scope or size. Heroic and impressive in quality. Epic is perhaps a word that is used too liberally when describing caving trips. Our Titan through trip is one of those rare instances where the word epic can be properly applied. Hopefully this report isn't! We started our day at the Chapel with Westminster Speleo Group. They... read more

What an awe inspiring place Titan Shaft is! A great trip involving 7 hours of wall to wall caving. Prior to reaching the entrance we has a lovely walk up in the sun. To get to Titan there is a very highly engineered 45 m entrance shaft with a Scaffold cage at the top to rig the entrance rope off. This in itself was a nice decent, the rigging was somewhat bizarre, two sling were rigged off two scaff bars... read more

Chad - That Noose at the top has been there for ages. I just found a picture of Jimmy G contemplating it! http://www.yucpc.org.uk/imgsize.php?img=http://www.yucpc.org.uk/photos/2006_06_TitanJH/014.jpg&w=500&h=500&constrain=true

Originally we were supposed to be doing Ireby II but Matt wanted a short trip and we couldn't be arsed packing ropes so we changed to Maracaibo instead. Matt and Andy were already in Ingleton so we met them in Bernies before 10 after a super-quick start and drive, despite having to collect the car from Ollie's after beerage! We told the others we had changec plans, and convinced Andy to buy an Omni (I want one too!), and one... read more

I rigged.

Along with a recent Easegill trip this has to be one of the most satisfying trips that I have done so far. We had a focussed team of five who embarked on a mission entitled ‘Operation Silent Echo’ with the aim of getting to Jupiter Cavern. This was a total success ensuring that we were the first members of YUCPC to reach Jupiter cavern. Matt G put so much effort into planning this trip that it became the most organised... read more

This turned out to be a relatively faffy trip. It took a while to find the hole for Swinsto and confirm it was the right one – there are quite a few in that field! There was also lots of faff from the other team – Mark’s helmet was locked in Chucks car and Josh’s hire light had failed. Eventually though we all got undergound. Chuck rigged the first 2 pitches then I did the rest. The third (my first) had... read more

A good trip, looking back on it it was pretty hard, should porbably get 4.5, although I was in cordura. By the end I was absolutly frozen and I think Andy had to talk/drag me out of the last bits!

The slit is hard to fit through even if your a scrawney runt, much easier just to rig the Aven up to the left of the slit.

Our intended trip was to do Flood entrance, but this was not an option after finding out in Bernies that the caves around Gaping Gill were been set up for the winch meet. Naturally I was disappointed as I had spent much of the previous evening studying the rigging guide and descriptions as I was to rig. So I hope I get the chance to do this cave in the near future. While deciding what we were going to do... read more

After Ben and Craig from MUSC informed us that this was the weekend of the winch meet at Gaping Gill, we called off our Gaping Gill trip and decided to join them at Marble Steps Pot. A short walk up the hill reminded me of how unfit I was, but the pleasant entrance made up for it. Ben was to rig sidewinder, with Craig and myself following, while Chad would rig for the others down Gully. The cave was dry, and... read more

We got to the bottom! More to follow...

Trapdoor has to go down as one of the best trips I’ve ever done. I had been lead to believe that it would tight, wet and horrible with death around every corner; however I found it quite the opposite. An efficient breakfast in Bernies (and purchase of a new Omni main mallion for quick release of the SRT kit in the promised awkwardness of trap door) lead us to the cave for about 12pm. Nice sunny weather (contrary to the report)... read more

Garys description is a spot on recollection. I think I would suggest the cave is a little harder than he does, however my legs are longer than his and much less bendy, which poses greater challenges in some of the more restrictive sections. The esoteric squeeze was so much fun as it provided some great manoeuvering challenges without being unpleasantly tight. My purchase of a Petzl Omni (screwgate main maillion for quick release) was worth every penny as my... read more

After an interesting route up the hill we quickly found the cave, an un-inviting scree crawl in a large shake hole. Gong carefully down this we followed the stream through a fun rift to the first pitch, a short 6 metre abb, then more of the rift until we arrived ina large-ish chamber at the top of the second pitch. An interesting collection of jammed boulders hung like Damocle's sword above the pitch head, I didnt hang around when it... read more

Extra faff points as the other teams had all the ropes suitable for the double decker pull through. A little bit of time wasted finding out the hard way that the rope we brought was too short. Progress continued down the fixed hand line down the rift. All in all the trip was very efficient and we made swift progress throughout, with Anna getting to derig her second cave, to be back in time for lunch.

We arrived at the car park just after 10 and after double-checking with the manager that it was “dry” enough to go in, we all set about changing into our wetsuits. At the end of the show cave we let the keen early-bird tourists past then hopped over the railing into the underground lake. Swimming with an oversuit on was very bizarre, even more so was trying to swim with wellies! After maybe 100m of swimming we reached the boulder... read more

A nice abb down Lancaster Hole saw me in Ease Gill for the first time. What felt like a few miles of passage, but probably wasnt that far, led to highlights such as the chamber below the Cow Pot main pitch, which looks very inspiring and would be a great dramatic pitch in either direction. After listening to the booming tackle bag noises and muffled swearing of the Cow Pot team we decided not to wait for them as... read more

After several emails to & fro between Cat & I we decided that a round trip including Easter Grotto, which we were both keen to visit, would be a great start to a Bull Pot Farm weekend. On the Friday night we recruited another couple of Chemists in Anna & Chad and after a very small amount of sleep we were ready to go, complete with reams of descriptions/surveys, cereal bars and the obligatory scones. The weather was better than expected... read more

After deciding that I wanted an epic Easegill trip on Saturday and really wanted to see Easter Grotto, Mark and I came up with a plan, and I spent half of Thursday and Friday printing off descriptions and surveys to make sure we didn’t get lost… Saturday morning came, and after a severe lack of sleep we kitted up and headed across the moor. Mark and I went into County to rig the ladder then we set off further up the... read more

After a nice drive and a plesant walk up to the moor we then spent a while watching Chuck poke his head down several shakeholes looking for Flood entrance but eventually we just decided to do Bar Pot, so off we went. After several late nights looking at pictures of the gaping gill main chamber and daydreaming during lectures about standing by the waterfall I was excited to be going there, a place I'd wanted to go to since I... read more

a big and enjoyable, sunny, walk past tourists heading for ingleborough cave or mountain brought us to the canyon of death, a wall of darkness ensued as the sunlight passed the tip of the rock climbers paridise and the first of the dead bunny rabbit's. sunlight could be seen at the other end of the canyon...... to be continued .... waiting by the entrance to some unknown pot was quite funny as we were describing to families of people why we... read more

The walk up Inglebrough was baking, but at least there was a nice breeze… Turns out we did find Wades, just didn’t realise it at the time, as it didn’t look like the description (first pitch looked like only 4m so we assumed this was Flood – but actually what we saw wasn’t the floor, just a shelf). Oh well, we’ll be back! In Bar Pot, Chuck knew where he was going whereas I’d never been so I let him lead between... read more