L
Langthwaite Pot
Guest
11/09/05 - BAR POT
Present: JC and GN
Once upon a time in a Land known as Yorkshire there were two cavers - a big caver, and a slightly bigger caver. Now thinking it a particularly fine and sunny day they decided to head off for the slightly damper and less well trodden parts of the Gaping Gill system, thinking it would make a pleasant change to the tropical temperatures at the surface.
So they set off promptly from the car park, having stopped only briefly to listen to the cricket and strode purposefully up the hill (halting only occasionally for a quick rest because they were knackered). As they went small children stopped and stared and asked their parents "Mummy, are they real potholers?"...
At the entrance we were unsurprised to find people allready in the cave. Fortunately however they were just coming out. Much to my amazement the woman who appeared first was wearing what is probably the most extrordinary piece of caving attair I have ever seen. Upon her feet were a pair of fluorescent pink wellies complete with bright pink buckles. With this bit of excitment over we continued on our journey into the cave and soon reached the bottom of the big pitch.
At the bottom of the nearby aven we dropped down a small hole as described in the guide book until we reached a rather definite silt choke. It turned out that the actual entrance to New Henslers is a rather less obvious hole just up the slope. New Henslers consists of approximately 100m of easy but boring crawling followed by about 50m of really pretty squalid crawling, which I suspect may be avoidable. After a muddy squeeze we emerged in Henslers Master Cave which begins in fairly inimpressive style but soon becomes delightfully stonking. After a bit of fannying around we finally decided that the correct way on was up a boulder slope and into a really rather nice section of 'Coffin Level' shaped passage.
Soon enough we reached the ubiquitous shitty iron ladder. This was a classic of its type being both muddy and slippy, and wobbly. This lead into a less than impressive crwling tube which soon lead to the finest feature of the trip (and in my opinion the whole of the GG system) 'The Blowhole' . This is a perfectly person sized hole in the wall of a little chamber with an impressive draught blowing through, aswell as a marvellous little pool half way through. With SRT kits removed we were soon past this obstacle and into the passage on the other side which was short lived as the Echo Rift pitch apperared in the floor. There was a fair amount of pissing around at the top of this due to the lack of both any sensible hangers (we only had clowns) awell as a spanner to actually do them up with. Anyway a dubious tacklesack rope protector was soon improvised and the pitch was safely descended (although it must be said that the rigging was of a type that is unlikely to appear in one of Mr Sparrows manuals anytime soon).
The pitch drops into a muddy canal (Southgate) which was filled with rather unpleasently cold water. This soon ended at a gloomy pool where a sharp left turn was made thtough a short duck into yet more gloomy passage. The atmosphere was added to by the air pockets in the walls boomed ominously as we moved along, infact the only feature of note was the 'Brown Pool' which was indeed a brown pool on the Left hand Side of the passage. James spotted a small airspace above this and was soon in up to his nose, where upon he reached in his words 'the best duck ever' (described as a sump in the guidebook) though he decided to leave pushing it till another day. A bit further on we reached the start of Sahara passage where we decided to call it a day as it was pretty chilly in only a furry suit and we were both starting to shake quite a bit.
An unevetful exit was made from the cave until we reached the entrance where we were met by a couple of folk from Leeds university counting bats.
All in all it was a fine trip, but i'll be taking a wetsuit next time!
GN.
Present: JC and GN
Once upon a time in a Land known as Yorkshire there were two cavers - a big caver, and a slightly bigger caver. Now thinking it a particularly fine and sunny day they decided to head off for the slightly damper and less well trodden parts of the Gaping Gill system, thinking it would make a pleasant change to the tropical temperatures at the surface.
So they set off promptly from the car park, having stopped only briefly to listen to the cricket and strode purposefully up the hill (halting only occasionally for a quick rest because they were knackered). As they went small children stopped and stared and asked their parents "Mummy, are they real potholers?"...
At the entrance we were unsurprised to find people allready in the cave. Fortunately however they were just coming out. Much to my amazement the woman who appeared first was wearing what is probably the most extrordinary piece of caving attair I have ever seen. Upon her feet were a pair of fluorescent pink wellies complete with bright pink buckles. With this bit of excitment over we continued on our journey into the cave and soon reached the bottom of the big pitch.
At the bottom of the nearby aven we dropped down a small hole as described in the guide book until we reached a rather definite silt choke. It turned out that the actual entrance to New Henslers is a rather less obvious hole just up the slope. New Henslers consists of approximately 100m of easy but boring crawling followed by about 50m of really pretty squalid crawling, which I suspect may be avoidable. After a muddy squeeze we emerged in Henslers Master Cave which begins in fairly inimpressive style but soon becomes delightfully stonking. After a bit of fannying around we finally decided that the correct way on was up a boulder slope and into a really rather nice section of 'Coffin Level' shaped passage.
Soon enough we reached the ubiquitous shitty iron ladder. This was a classic of its type being both muddy and slippy, and wobbly. This lead into a less than impressive crwling tube which soon lead to the finest feature of the trip (and in my opinion the whole of the GG system) 'The Blowhole' . This is a perfectly person sized hole in the wall of a little chamber with an impressive draught blowing through, aswell as a marvellous little pool half way through. With SRT kits removed we were soon past this obstacle and into the passage on the other side which was short lived as the Echo Rift pitch apperared in the floor. There was a fair amount of pissing around at the top of this due to the lack of both any sensible hangers (we only had clowns) awell as a spanner to actually do them up with. Anyway a dubious tacklesack rope protector was soon improvised and the pitch was safely descended (although it must be said that the rigging was of a type that is unlikely to appear in one of Mr Sparrows manuals anytime soon).
The pitch drops into a muddy canal (Southgate) which was filled with rather unpleasently cold water. This soon ended at a gloomy pool where a sharp left turn was made thtough a short duck into yet more gloomy passage. The atmosphere was added to by the air pockets in the walls boomed ominously as we moved along, infact the only feature of note was the 'Brown Pool' which was indeed a brown pool on the Left hand Side of the passage. James spotted a small airspace above this and was soon in up to his nose, where upon he reached in his words 'the best duck ever' (described as a sump in the guidebook) though he decided to leave pushing it till another day. A bit further on we reached the start of Sahara passage where we decided to call it a day as it was pretty chilly in only a furry suit and we were both starting to shake quite a bit.
An unevetful exit was made from the cave until we reached the entrance where we were met by a couple of folk from Leeds university counting bats.
All in all it was a fine trip, but i'll be taking a wetsuit next time!
GN.
