Top Sink - Pippikin Pot Top to Pip

Saturday May 2nd 2026

Members present: Alfie Exall,  Jakub Dominikowski

Once upon a time, on a dark and stormy Monday evening the infamous YUCPC newsletter appeared in my inbox. Eager to find out what kind of madness is going on, without hesitation I slammed the mouse button. The instant I saw “Bull Pot Farm” something had shifted- like the click of a lock. The ideas in my brain were no longer theoretical; what was about to happen felt inevitable.

Bull Pot farm is a premier destination for an excited caver, there are near infinite possibilities for trips. With the weather in the past week bringing dry conditions, the long awaited Easegill traverse had been put on the calendar. With a very good team sorted, it was just a matter of surviving a few weeks of lectures until we can finally immerse our souls in the ecstasy of caving. Well, at least that's what I thought…

The weekend started off with absolutely gorgeous weather, in York that is. With each kilometer closer to the Dales, the sky appeared to grow darker and gloomier. By the time we arrived it was apparent that the rain forecast for Friday night was not a joke. Sometimes I wish I could just pick the forecast I like the most. This meant that my pre-rigging trip had been delayed by a few hours. The 2am callout had now turned into a 7am callout. Shortly after 9.30 pm, I set off for Bye George Pot.

Bye George Pot? But that’s not the real Easegill traverse! Well you see, myself, Toby, Tom and Lydia have done Pippikin numerous times and the prospect of doing it again did not seem exciting. After rigging Link Pot I made my way up to Leck Fell, which of course was covered in thick fog. The visibility was as bad as it gets, with the additional darkness I was really worried finding Bye George would be almost impossible- and surprise myself I did. I’m not quite sure how I manage it everytime. Seeing the yellow cover over the peaty hollow was quite possibly the happiest moment of my evening.

I shall not get into what Bye George is like, this is a story for another day. But to sum up, a solo trip down Bye George was quite possibly the stupidest thing I have ever done in a cave. I turned around partway down smashing inlet after getting slightly stuck with my face in water (which I blame on the stupid bag). Turns out that the cobbles in the floor make bag pushing a very hard endeavour indeed. Slightly traumatised, I went back to put ropes on Echo Aven. It did have an in-situ on it but the mailons were uncomfortably rusty. With the cards set in play, it was time to sleep until Saturday morning.

Expecting to set off at 9am, I found myself very surprised when at 8am, I saw a message from Tom saying they are 20 minutes away. Naturally, I panicked and decided to scour the ovens for any food I could find. Hey- a half raw breakfast is better than no breakfast. It turns out this endeavour was pointless as the team ahead of us was faffing, meaning we had to wait anyway. After more faff and Tom complaining he could have had more sleep, we left the hut just after 9.30 am.

Walking with Tom and Toby is always a pleasure, their humour diverts my attention from any discomfort suffered by the uphill slog. Thankfully, on this occasion they held back any comments about my bad habits, avoiding embarrassment in front of Alife. With Top Sink located it was time to begin the underground fun. I led the way, with the descriptions stored in my sweaty undersuit (yummy).

The allegedly “loose” scaffold climb did not appear to be loose, although I didn’t spend much time trying to pull it apart. Top Sink is quite uninteresting until the pitches, most of it is a narrow winding canyon with the upper part being covered in orangey looking mud. The pitches are quite cool, although the 11mm (?) ropes left by SUSS were not appreciated. I suppose it’s better than not being rigged.

Beyond Bradshaw’s passage the first real parts of navigation start. The route here is fairly cool, the crossing over a deep rift is very fun and there are some interesting climbs on the way. Alfie took over this bit of navigation, as he has done Top Sink to Nagasaki Cavern before. Nagasaki Cavern itself is quite impressive. I expected the upstream parts of Easegill to be of much smaller proportions.

The next interesting part of the cave is Thackray’s passage, which is a very nicely decorated streamway. Thinking about it now, this was probably my favourite bit of passage of the trip, there are some incredible formations around the streamway. Most of the journey to Stop Pot was uneventful. We were speeding through so there is not really much to talk about. Tom seems to think that Stop Pot is a part of the Lancaster Speedrun (Wilf Taylor’s, main drain, Stake pot, round trip).

At the top of Stop Pot we briefly discussed the contents of my first aid kit, where I foolishly without thinking have made a very silly comment (which I very much apologise for). Shortly after this, we arrived at the main line terminus. I really like this area. If I were to build a home in a cave, this would be the place. In an excited state, I couldn’t help myself and started running through the large passages of the high level route. Despite having done this route multiple times, my racing lines were suboptimal with Toby quickly taking over. At one point Tom said that I was taking him through a V2 (bouldering grade) traverse.

Just before Stake Pot we met another group of YUCPC cavers who were doing the magic roundabout and out via Link. Following a quick confirmation of where to find the entrance to Stake Pot series, we were ready for our well deserved break. I say break, but this was a full on picnic, consisting of a spanish omelette and Lydia’s banana bread. Well I think banana bread slop would be more accurate. Despite this it was still very delicious! Both Tom and Toby made themselves feel sick from all the calories.

The picnic did not last very long. Having just raced through the upper half of Easegill, I was absolutely drenched in sweat and therefore starting to get cold. We quickly made our way to the wormway, where once again I decided racing through it would be the best idea. I’m not a big fan of stooping, so the faster we go through it in theory the less time we spend doing it. We had a little sit down by Echo Aven as everyone was slowly making their way up. Tom rather unsuccessfully tried to kill me with a boulder.

From here the way to Link Pot is very short. Since I was last one up the pitch I shouted some directions down the winding stream way. Somehow, everyone managed to miss the “massive jammed boulder” and once again I was at the front. We made quick work of the Link crawl. When we got to Wet Wallows I decided to be cool and rather foolishly do it on my front. For the last part of this crawl I ended up having to hold my breath with my face in water.

Not long after we arrived at Dusty Junction. This is where Tom decided that he did not feel the need to go out via Pippikin. Fair enough, he probably would have fallen asleep in the squeezes. So we left the biggest tackle sack we had with Tom and started our outward journey via Pippikin.

This is possibly the hardest Pippikin has ever felt for me. Still got through without much fuss but the effect of Friday night and most of the Easegill were apparent. This was Alife’s first time in Pippikin and he absolutely cruised it. It was nice to hear that he thought this was epic. After disappearing into the boulder choke at Hall of The Ten, the next time I saw Lydia and Toby was on the surface.

Anyway, this is a pretty cool trip. The passages upstream of Stop Pot are really nice. I do have to say, the caving itself is not that interesting. If you’re looking for an interesting experience this is not the trip, it's just long without any interesting obstacles. At least now I know that a return trip to Bye George is required…