Win a Rab Nebula Jacket worth ?160!!

Pegasus

Administrator
Staff member
WIN A RAB NEBULA INSULATED JACKET WORTH ?160!!

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The winner may chose either a men's or ladies Nebula jacket in the size/colour of their choice (depending on stock availability).  Here's what Rab have to say about their lovely new jacket.....( I added in the bit about getting changed  ;))

'FOR THE MOST EXTREME CONDITIONS IN THE WORLD
Winter insulation experts Rab have introduced new Cirrus? technology to their winter 2015 collection.
Rab Cirrus? takes Rab?s expertise in natural down and mimics it closely in a unique synthetic technology.
Developed in partnership with 3M, Cirrus? fibres create loft to give the same warmth-to-weight as 600FP
duck down. Rapid drying times make Cirrus? ideal for mixed and unreliable weather conditions.
Rab?s new Nebula jackets offer cavers the warmth and low weight of natural down jackets in a water resilient, fast-drying package using Cirrus technology - ideal for getting changed on a cold fell in Winter!
The Nebula jacket features a Pertex Endurance shell for increased durability and weather protection, and a
helmet fit hood.
?For Rab, producing the best down products possible is where it all started,? explains Tim Jasper, Head of
Design at Rab. ?Now with the introduction of Cirrus?, we have harnessed decades of down expertise to
evolve a synthetic technology that offers a genuine alternative.?
The Nebula jacket is available in men?s S-XXL and women?s 8-16, and the Nimbus in men?s S-XXL.
For more information visit http://rab.equipment


(y) Thank you, Rab for supporting ukcaving  (y)

Surely every caver has a tale to tell about being cold, tired, exhausted underground and being oh so grateful to finally be out of the cave and getting changed??  Tell us your story by posting here to be in with a chance of winning a warm Rab jacket ready for Winter.

Competition closes midnight on 30th November 2015.

We will compile a (long) short list of the best reports and chose a winner at random from that list. 

So providing some effort is made to tell a good tale of being cold, tired, exhausted underground, everyone is in with a chance of winning!!

Good Luck!!
 

JoshW

Well-known member
Oooh a chance to share a story of my stupidity! (Post ended up a bit longer than expected, must be a slow day at work - long story short, I'm stupider and fatter than I thought)

It was the weekend of the BPC gaping gill winch meet in May, my first weekend in Yorkshire (as a southerner), and my first experience of SRTing inside a cave.

The previous day had gone perfectly to plan in Ireby Fell down Ding, Dong, Bell, and my questionable SRT technique was holding out, through a combination of 'blagging it' and brute force.

We marched up Ingleborough having parked in Clapham, full of enthusiasm towards the winch. Despite temptation to take the easy route in on the winch, I was pressured into actually doing some caving and taking the bar pot route in along with some others from West Sussex.

The first pitch was awkward but manageable going down and left us in a small chamber at the bottom with several routes off. Badger advised that there is a slightly less cosy (and potentially less awkward) pitch head in small mammal house and pointed to a small hole just off the floor. He said he fit through but only once his SRT gear had been removed.

We continued down the big pitch and got through to Gaping Gill with relative ease. So far so good, not a problem.

We decided to return up bar pot as there was beer calling our names. Badger at this point decides to use his earlier bought pass to proceed up the winch (git).

The big pitch took big effort and my frankly shit SRT technique was starting to show. by the top of the pitch my left elbow was totally out of action, and my left arm was hanging by my side. On the route to the first pitch I needed big assistance from Doldy.

I remembered Badger's directions and proceeded to crawl through. It seemed cosy but matched his description of a cosy bedding plane. I thought if Badger can fit through without his SRT, it should be an issue to get through with mine on (big mistake as you'll see).

Once I was about 5 or 6 metres through this bedding plane, still one arm down and having to breathe out to move on, I start to wonder whether Badger did take this route.

I can see it start to open up a few metres ahead and decide my best option is to get to the opening and decide what to do from there. squeezing on another 3 metres or so, and I'm now fully wedged. My SRT kit is acting as an anchor through the thick squalorific mud, and my energy is definitely fading.

The bedding plane is about 2 metres wide and I'm slap bang in the middle with no way of using the sides to push myself onwards. Panic starts to slowly (read very quickly) set in. Not ideal. Much swearing is directed towards the absent badger  :mad:

I decide at this point to ask if it's okay to cut the clubs harness off me to potentially free me from it. I got the okay, but couldn't reach my knife that was inside my oversuit. Bollocks.

It's at this point Doldy makes a run to grab some racing snakes from the main base on the top of the hill with Tim and Helen keeping me company from the other end of the passage.

After about 40 minutes of being laid flat out lizard style in mud, I'm absolutely chuffing freezing and miserable, and my mothers warnings of 'I don't like you caving' are running through my head. I see a light shine up the passage from behind me and directions from an unfamiliar voice giving instruction of what to do.

Despite my best efforts to wiggle backwards it's clear my hips and chest just won't go back the way they came. Thankfull the unfamiliar voice was able to wriggle through so that my foot was within arm length, and he pulled me back and I had a bit of momentum about me. Another few minutes of fantastic direction and encouragement from him and I was out in the chamber.

At this point the cavalry arrived, and in my dazed state I thanked the unfamiliar voice, whose actual name is Rob Middleton (or shall always be known as my knight in shining armour) before he dissappeared into the darkness. The rescuers had brought much needed hot soup to replenish me, so I drank some of this along with my chocolate bar still stashed in my pocket.

It was decided that it would be easier to haul me out of Small Mammal than the first pitch (still one arm down), so a crawl down the correct route towards small mammal passage ensued before being hauled up to safety by Aly Brook and the rest of the team. I arrived at the surface, totally coated in mud, drenched, exhausted and a little bit chilly, to be greeted by what felt like a tornade. I have never been colder in my entire life, and I still had to wander back down the hill to Clapham.

At that moment I really could've done with some kind of warm jacket to wear as opposed to soaking wet oversuit, furry and thermals.

Moral of the story: don't go through tight squeezes in SRT gear, it's really bloody stupid
Moral of the story 2: If badger says he's been somewhere, check it's actually badger guage before proceeding, he may have pointed you in the wrong direction
Moral of the story 3: never underestimate the power of tomato soup, fairly sure it brought me back from the brink.

Massive thanks to the rescue team that day including Rob, who I don't feel like I ever got chance to thank enough.

[Pegasus - does this also enter me for the rope or have I got to post it seperately?]
 

badger

Active member
spelling Josh, Souf, norf.
and I was nearly right had I been there instead of a nice 3 minute exit I could have told you it was wrong,  ;)

 

JoshW

Well-known member
for anyone that's interested, the squalorific squeeze is called allen's crawl, and I would wholeheartedly recommend it never be visited.
 

Pegasus

Administrator
Staff member
Hi Josh, great tale, thanks for posting  (y) - my favourite bit was - (git)  :LOL:

New competition rule - same post can't be entered into both the Spanset rope & Rab duvet competitions - sorry  :)
 

JoshW

Well-known member
Ahh oh well. Will have to do something. Equally as stupid to require a write up. Thanks for organising these comps Pegasus!
 

Hall2501

Member
This is a bit of a long one too, but hey it was a long trip :p

Throwing our kit into the back of a Peugeot Partner we set off to the dales, in order to attempt the much fabled penygent pot and Friday the 13th series. We parked the van outside the Bradford hut, while getting changed Nat threw one of my shoes at Rob who was urinating near the wall, the shoe landed just underneath him and was consequently pissed on, a running theme for the day?

After getting changed we walked up the hill in our dry, roasting (Nat: ?Testicle crushing?) wetsuits. Nat was having particular trouble bending his legs more than 30 degrees, and we decided it was probably best to go up topless (good nudity), after frightening many families and old couples with our appearance on the way up, we made it to the unremarkable cave entrance.

We quickly kitted up and headed down the scaffolding into the entrance crawl (Double kneepads recommended), the water was pretty cold, I was glad I was wearing gloves & neoprene. The trip down was much faster than we expected, probably owing to the ?pitches? we decided were actually mostly free climbs.

After about 4-5 hours, we arrived at the sump. Rob and I carefully climbed round the edge of a deep pool to have a look at it, I turned around to see Nat?s headlamp underwater, soon followed by Nat remerging from the pool, gasping for air. Exclaiming that the pool was so deep he didn?t actually hit the floor, he managed to persuade Rob to jump in too. For? ?fun?.

At this point I was pretty warm and there wasn?t much water in my wetsuit so I had no intention of jumping in the water with them, unfortunately this wasn?t good enough for Rob and Nat who decided they wouldn?t be happy unless I was completely soaked too, Nat grabbed my cows tails and pulled me into the pool with him.

A moment later I looked up to see murky water & my yellow light flickering above me, quickly followed by cold water running down my neck. I was having flash backs to some traumatic swimming lessons I had when I was 5. I quickly resurfaced to hear Nat and Rob laughing at me, I wasn?t friends with them anymore.

The original plan was to just head to the sump and back, however Mike Butcher had somehow convinced Rob a side trip to the Friday the 13th series, was a good idea.
After an exposed traverse over the top of the 10th pitch and some stooping/crawling passage, we came to a big deep hole in the floor (Eerie Pot), we could see the passage continue ahead and some questionable ropes and rusty bolts on the floor to the right of us running to the other side of the hole. Double checking the description we were certain that this must be the right place and we needed to get across the hole.

Nat headed off first, clipping his cows tails into the rope and edging his way across the traverse, complaining all the way, ?oooh I don?t like this, this isn?t safe?. Rob and I found this hilarious & assumed Nat was just over reacting. Reassuring Nat the traverse/Tyrolean was fine and the sketchy looking ropes were probably fine; definitely not attached to the wall with rusty wobbly hangers and an ancient hex.
Nat made it across and was followed by Rob, ?eek this is horrible, how did you do this?? slightly concerned by Robs response to the traverse, I set off across next and after looking across the traverse I realised why they were concerned, ?Okay yeah, usually stuff like this doesn?t faze me but this is pretty bad?. Putting my bodyweight on the traverse above the deep hole, I carefully shuttled across to join the others.

So the misery begins? Nat began reading the description from the Black book, ?Psycho Crawl deteriorates into a flat-out waterlogged struggle?. Nice...

Optimistic the black book was over exaggerating I followed the others into the flat out crawl, after missing a turning somewhere we went the wrong way into, what we think were some choked oxbows, which ended up being worse than Psycho Crawl, gritting my teeth - with grit in my teeth we carried on thruching through the passage. After lots of face in muddy water, flat out crawling over submerged cobbles we were really hoping for a break at some point soon, eventually we stopped when we realised the straws ahead of us in the passage were blocking our way and were not broken, meaning we had obviously gone the wrong way.

Group morale was decreasing rapidly as we headed back the way we came, we gave the passage a second chance & I lead the way through more flat out crawling down another passage on the right. Almost as unpleasant a the first one the passage ended with some flow stone formation blocking our way, some backwards flat out crawling and interesting turning around manovers later, we managed to get back to the start my morale was approaching zero.

Back at the beginning we took a left turn, down which was probably/defiantly psycho crawl which was actually nicer than the oxbows but still utterly miserable and to make things worse the contents of the over packed tackle sack I was carrying started overflowing and getting stuck on everything (Apparently Watty went through in 1986, in his underwear! I wonder if that?s how it got its name).

The flat out crawl eventually opened out into hands and knees crawling and then into a stooping passage, where we stopped for a break. After contemplating leaving at this point, we deicide after coming this far we should at least attempt to make it to the sump.

The passage went round a corner into a canal, I eased myself into the water and carried on. Rob managed to trip over his tackle sack and face planted into the canal, surfacing he looked furious, ?ARGGH, I?m doing this F#!?-ing sump now!? With rekindled determination we pressed on down the canal, the roof started getting closer to the floor and the water up to our crotches. It was at this point we discovered the joys of pissing in our wetsuits, ?Ahh, it?s better than an orgasm?, ?yay, my feet are warm again?? ?I?m glad this is Mike?s wet suit?. When the roof started getting too low, we sent rob ahead to check out the rest of the canal, he came back looking slightly hypothermic and we decided to call it a day.

Heading back to the surface we arrived at the traverse over the top of the 10th pitch, while climbing across - the foothold I was using broke off, luckily my hand placements were good and I didn?t fall off.

Arriving at the 4th pitch, I went up first, Nat had instructed me to double up the sling on the deviation, which was hanging dubiously off a flake. I folded the sling in half and wrapped it around the flake. On the way up the second pitch I hear Nat shouting, ?Brendan you moron!?. Not thinking too much about it I headed up the 3rd pitch and met Nat at the top. Apparently I had managed to rig the deviation in such a way that the karabiner somehow unclipped itself from the sling and hit him on the way up (I seem to have a talent for this). To calm himself down Nat decided to piss himself again and everything was good.

To save time we split up and bombed it to the surface, after what seemed like an eternity of crawling I eventually made it to the scaffolding near the entrance and headed back to the hut. After getting changed I headed into the kitchen and laid out the sandwiches and cake I brought for the civilised post cave tea party, I had been planning this in my head most of the trip.

Nat walked in and told me Rob needed my assistance, rob was in the changing room and was having trouble getting out of mikes wetsuit, after lots of pulling and homoerotic noises, the suit finally slipped off past his feet and hit me in the face, covering me in robs pissy, foot, cave water, very nice.
Never been happier to be in dry clothes drinking tea and eating cake after a trip.
 
Little Hull Pot aka Lets Spend the Day Freezing Our B******s Off.

Less a tale of hardcore caving and more one of unrelenting faff in a relatively easy cave.

After an early start, we (6 of us or so) all met in various dribs and drabs at the Penyghent caf? in Horton.  No-one got out the car. We just parked up next to each other in the snow, wound a window down and stared at each other and the snow covered hills, hoping that someone else would can the trip and suggest a swift return to Manchester and the many warm pubs.  We looked like some very committed doggers. After waiting past opening time, we elected to bang on the door of the caf?  - a bit rude, but we really wanted a brew. Eventually we got in and had a bit of food and a natter.  The owner did also offer, after pointing out how cold we were going to be, to open up the caf? later on that evening.

Certain members of our club can be a bit slow getting ready, not today. Everyone was dressed and kitted in quick time and ready for the walk up to Little Hull Pot.  It was relatively slow walk up, slipping and sliding on the ice, everyone with balaclavas pulled up, not talking. Most of us probably thinking about taking up darts.

In my opinion, it?s never a precursor to a warm or comfortable trip when one of the team members is carrying a full size snow shovel with him to help excavate the entrance if required.  After finding the entrance, we headed in. No digging required, so the snow shovel was stashed.

After this we had a lovely trip, a bit wet, a fun pitch involving swinging around through a window and a bigger main drop.  A fair bit of water around but nothing major.  A failed deviation added some excitement to the rigging of the big drop; nothing gets the heart going like a loud shout, a big bang and then just enough silence to get you worried before someone shouts up that it?s all OK. Albeit they are sat on the floor with a rather sore backside.

After the second pitch and upon viewing the watery crawl through to the next section of the cave, a few people elected to head back out, whilst some pushed on to the end, and others being especially stupid, did the wet crawl just to say they had done it before returning immediately and heading out. That would be me then.

What then followed was one of the longest trips of my life. Faffing at the big pitch, slow climbing, cold crawls, drafts and spray.  In the end after the second pitch, one of the bottomers caught me up and said that the last two would be doing the de-rigging but would appreciate someone waiting to carry some bags. OK.  So we waited in the entrance crawl. And we waited some more. Lying against cold rock, completely wet through.  We crawled back and forth to keep warm, went out the cave and jumped around a bit, then crawled back in and just sat in misery.

Eventually we wandered back to the first pitch to carry out some more hardcore waiting around.  Eventually the last two arrived after a faffy de-rigging and we made it out onto the surface into a pitch black night.  I am blessed with a reasonable amount of ?bioprene? so tend not to feel the cold.  I felt it that night.  Balaclava up (although it was pissed wet through), hands tucked in suit, heads down ? let?s get this walk back done. A few of the others could be seen by their head torches heading down the hill, this was no team exit ? people were too cold and just heading back.  About three of us headed down to Horton together, my light was failing and back then I didn?t carry a spare.  The path down had turned into an absolute ice rink, and whilst we at first enjoyed the sight of our fellows slipping, sliding and carrying out some amazing ?Home Alone? style falls ? the novelty soon wore off when it was the viewer who then had a turn impacting the ice.  Attempts were made at sliding back down the path sat on the snow showel but alas it wasn?t as successful as we hoped. The walk down did at least learn to a communal sharing of various new ways of swearing.  Mainly about caving, the ice and why we were not better at football thus meaning we would never have had to start caving in the beginning.  After about a 90 minute walk / dance / falling / fiasco we made it back to the cars were some of the others were already sat in the caf? ? again after we had banged on the door and asked them to open up.

I am sure some had said this before, but our gear was frozen on. We couldn?t undo maillons, screw gates, couldn?t touch the metal without gloves, couldn?t operate the damn things with gloves on. My cows tails were like pipe cleaners ? you could bend them whichever way you wanted and they stayed that way, and my oversuit covered in frost was propped up against the car vertically.  It?s a good trip but I am not doing it again in the winter.  It was a long drive home, heating on full power, trying to get feeling back into my toes.  The only real benefit was that after shivering and throwing up all night, I got a day off work.

Some of the club went back this year, and in their report the opening phrase is something along the lines of ?The only previous time I'd been here it had been deepest winter and all I remembered was the snowy treacherous freezing walk back?.

Fun times.
 

aricooperdavis

Moderator
It's not easy to compete with all these amazing stories, but I'll share my own moment of stupidity.

It's a boiling hot day (say... 38?C?) in the south of France, and the club is visiting some new caves. We've taken a look at the topo, and it looks like a fairly simple job - 4 pitches almost stacked on top of each other, with very little actual caving in between.

There are about 7 of us wanting to descend, and only 5 SRT kits, so I head down in the first group and have an explore. It's a pretty little cave, with a reasonable (30m +) final pitch that descends into a pool at the bottom. A tiny rebelay just below the top of the pitch makes it an interesting exercise for new cavers, and I like rigging, so it's fun for me too.  Everyone's impressed by the descent with some beautiful flowstone on the walls, and a wonderfully cool pool at the bottom. As is typical, I ascend back up last, so 30m of bouncy ascent whilst pulling all that rope through my chest ascender leaves me a little tired.

I leave the cave, burst into the boiling sunshine again, and lie down under a tree in the shade. I think we managed to get through about 4 litres of water per person per day on that trip; it was exhausting. I strip out of my oversuit and lie there in a T-shirt and swimming trunks, and try not to think about all the ants that were starting to crawl all over us all.

After about an hour, I start to wonder where the other group has got to. It's hot, I'm tired, and I don't expect to be gone long, so I pop a spare SRT kit over my shorts and T-shirt and head back down. I reach the top of the final 30m pitch to find the last person having just reached the top and clutching their groin in agony - apparently they'd got a testicle trapped in their leg strap half way up, and the pain was unbearable.

So I send them off up the next pitch and de-rig the rope. After coiling all the rope again I'm starting to feel a little chilly, as I hadn't anticipated being underground for so long. But no worries; I'll be out in a jiffy right? Nope.

It doesn't take long to realise that the last person up left the rope bag at the bottom of the pitch.

So I re-rig the pitch - but I'm starting to get cold now, so rather than rig the rebelay I just cows-tail into a safety line, lean right out, and rig a direct drop right down the middle of the shaft. Unfortunately, being 6ft2, I was the only one who could actually lean out to de-rig it too, so rather than escape back into the warmth, I have to stand at the top of the pitch and do star-jumps whilst the pitch is descended.

It doesn't take all that long to get down it, get the rope bag, and re-ascend - and it takes even less time to de-rig and get the rope sorted out, but by that time my fingers are starting to get properly chilly. It takes about another half hour to de rig the rest of the pitches and leave.

By the time we're all out I'm no longer fed up with that exhausting 38?C heat, but absolutely thankful for it, as I get out shivering, wearing only swimming trunks and a T-shirt. I didn't think to bring a down jacket and wooly hat on that trip, but maybe in the future I'll ignore my senses and bring one anyway, as I could have done with it in that cave!

My lesson learnt: however warm it is outside the cave, it's still damn chilly inside in the wet and the dark.

Now I know that sounds pathetic in comparison to some of these snow-melt / frozen equipment / hypothermia stories, and I have some of those myself too, but I didn't want to bore you all will that  :)
 

cap n chris

Well-known member
"There's a cracking dig through there!"...

It's been a good few years now since the hey-day of Kev Sp8's uber-enthusiasm used to get me fired up to join my smiling caving chum on his madcap mission(s) and one of these was to push a charming and highly inviting little sump in the further reaches of Upper Flood Swallet, the tenth anniversary of the discovery of which happens to be next year; there are many parts of the cave that hold secrets and promises of onward passages and the elusive continuing route persists in thwarting all comers. Kev is not one of the daunted.

Although it was a summertime trip, we planned to be in the cave for many hours as the commute alone, in this streamway cave, would be around four hours just to manhandle the digging gear (mostly piping and a pump) outbound and inbound (although I believe the pipe is still there but may have been retasked elsewhere by now); neofleece and neoprene socks are OK, but for perched sump water, digging out mud and pumping for several hours, it was insufficient to stop my feet becoming numb with cold. The return journey out of the cave was interesting because it was like walking on someone else's legs, or imaginary stilts, because there was no feeling or sense of feedback from the rocky pathways, and despite lingering in a shower afterwards to warm up it still took two days before I fully regained the normal sensitivity of the soles of my feet. Delicate flower, me.

There is a video of the malarks, here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MahfXyp6DL0
 

chunky

Well-known member
A couple of years ago I arranged an Oxlow / Maskhill exchange for the club.

We'd had a young girl join Dudley and recently train on SRT....for this trip she would be my responsibility and under my watchful eye.
Chloe had done well throughout the trip in to Maskhill and was feeling pretty confident by the time we reached the entrance pitch out of Oxlow. Her only worry was getting off at the top of the pitch and so I said I would go up first and spot her out.
As I emerged the weather had taken a turn for the worse, a blizzard had whited out the entire hillside and the windchill meant I soon couldn't feel my fingers or face.
I waited at the top of the pitch for almost half an hour for Chloe to emerge but finally I could stand it no more and made my way back down to the parked cars to try and warm my hands which had by this point quite literally turned blue.
With the heater at full blast I tried to defrost myself best I could, the blizzard began to ease off and the snow filled air cleared. I could now make out a very cold and tearful Chloe making her solitary way across the fields toward me.

If only I'd had a shiny new Rab Nebula Jacket I could have been chivalrous and not abandoned my post to leave a damsel in distress to try and climb out of Oxlow with frozen fingers that wouldn't open her stop!........and do you think she's ever let me forget it!  :chair:

105151.jpg
 

Dregson

New member
Here is a report of a trip down Black Shiver in 1981 when I nearly died of cold in the Hill Inn:

The clue is in the name. It is supposed to refer to the wobbly nature of the peat on that part of the fell where the entrance lies, but the cave itself is dark, not just lightless like all caves, but the itself rock is black. The entrance is obscure and low,  and wet and full of rounded pebbles that obstruct you. It is best to do this cave in winter, when the water on the fells is locked up in ice. Go down there in the summer and there is always the risk that a sudden summer shower will inundate the entrance crawl, trapping you inside for days until the long, low sections becomes passable again. But do it in winter, and the length of the trip will force you to emerge after dark, and shivering. It is not called Black Shiver for nothing.

If I am not selling this cave, I should be telling you instead of the glories of the streamway, and of the extravagant pitches with inspiring waterfalls that a caver will discover beyond the crawl. Black Shiver is one of the classic Yorkshire stream pots, as good as  Pen-y-Ghent Pot or Dale Head pot to name but two, and it has to be on the to-do list of every keen potholer who wants to tick off the best. IN 1981 we were exactly those kind of potholers.

We started at the Hill Inn. The Dales does fine pubs, that is for sure. Refuges of warmth and plenty in sharp relief to the wildness of the moors and the austerity of a trip down the caves. We wore wetsuits. Not so fashionalbe now, but in those days there were the best thing. Even  now, though,  I would prefer to be wearing one of these neoprene wonders if I were to find myself once again pushing a tacklebag ahead of me in a flat out bedding plane with a stream of meltwater for company. So in the car park of that pub, we stripped off in the January sun and buckled up our rubber suits for the yomp to the cave.

It took a long time to find. There is a long walk on the flat karst below Ingleborough hill, then a frustrating period looking for the entrance. It lies in a small stream sink, of which there are several. We had to look at them all until we found the correct one, the one that was just large enough to take us. It wouldn't do for a cave with a name like Black Shiver to have an easy entrance. I found that  it was only just big enough for me, and plentifully supplied with cobbles that pressed hard against my chest as I wormed my way down the flat bedding plane towards the first drop into the streamway.

After that, the cave proper begins. The passage enlarges and it becomes possible to walk, then there are big chambers and grandiose pitches down which we flung our ropes, sliding down on them with our whoops of delight drowned out by the roar of the falling stream. At the bottom of the cave, we felt elated as we ate a soggy Mars bar, and huddled next to the terminal sump. Then it was time to move out.

We inched our way up using primitive rope ascending methods. In the early 1980's it was difficult to buy ready made systems and we had built our own, knotting harnesses together using the Bradford system of a triple-tape, and using various Heath-Robinson strappings to hold us onto the ropes. The ascenders themselves had been made in his workshop by a friend, who was paid for his efforts in beer. Getting off the rope at the top of the pitches was tricky, with these ropewalkers, but we made it at last to the entrance crawl, pushing the tacklebags ahead of us, we felt an arctic draught. The stream was noticeably lower.

I emerged onto a frozen moorscape. The clear sky was pitted with bright stars. There was no moon, and the cold snap of the night had taken hold of Ingleborough Hill.  As I waited for my two companions to join me, I could feel the sodden strap of the tacklebag stiffening. It was way below zero.

The other two came out. ?Undo your wetsuit zip,? said one of them, ?because it will freeze on the walk back and we'll have to cut you out of it.?

So we walked back across the moor to the Hill Inn with our wetsuits undone, arms crossed to try to cuddle up some of our warmth. The sky was so clear we could see shadows of ourselves in the starlight.

In the pub car park we opened the car and arranged our clothes ready to get into them.  We used to grade the changes just like the caves. This would be Grade I. Outside, in the dark, below freezing, but it wasn't actually raining or snowing and there was a pub close, so not quite Grade V.

I leant against the roof of the car to pull off a boot, then couldn't remove my hand. The frost had seized my wet rubber glove and glued it to the metal. I had to pull my hand out and leave the glove there. We got changed fast. If caving in a Yorkshire winter teaches you only one thing, it is this. Getting changed fast. Rip off your wetsuit top and put on your vest, shirt and jumper. Put on your anorak and your bobble-hat ? only then take off your wetsuit trousers and get into your jeans.

The wetsuits were beginning to freeze when we shoved them into the boot and headed for the pub. Inside, it was bright, warm, noisy and welcoming. Everything that changing in the car park was not. We ordered three pints of beer and sat next to the fire, clinking the glasses together and drinking to our success in bottoming Black Shiver.

But then our day took a turn for the worse. It was then that we began to feel truly cold. A terrible chill seized all three of us and we started shivering uncontrollably. We became so cold in that pub that we couldn't speak. The shivering was so marked  that we were unable to pick up the glasses and finish the last mouthfuls of beer. That feeling of cold was possibly the most unpleasant thing I have endured. We sat there, in a warm pub, next to the fire, all wondering if we could ever be warm again. We had been fine in the cave, and had survived the march back across the fell. We had stripped off in a sub-zero car park, but were going to die of cold in a busy pub. It was absurd.

A man came over, seeing us shivering. He said that he could tell that we had been caving ? we were all mucky hair and faces ? and he started explaining why we were so cold. He was a doctor in Manchester, so he said, and realised that in the cave, on the walk, and in the car park, our bodies had conserved our core heat, but had let our arms, legs, skin, buttocks and faces drop down to very low temperatures. Once in the pub, blood began to flow to these peripheries and returned to the heart very cool. Our core temperature had fallen. In addition we had taken almost a pint of coolish beer and put it into our stomachs. No wonder we were cold. ?Just sit it out lads, it will pass eventually.?

And pass it did. Slowly, very slowly we warmed up enough to contemplate some more beer, and sipped it as the Doctor from Manchester went on with his lecture, his low-pitched monotonous voice reminding us of the sound the cobbles make as they roll along in the entrance to Black Shiver.
 

kay

Well-known member
Dregson said:
He was a doctor in Manchester, so he said, and realised that in the cave, on the walk, and in the car park, our bodies had conserved our core heat, but had let our arms, legs, skin, buttocks and faces drop down to very low temperatures. Once in the pub, blood began to flow to these peripheries and returned to the heart very cool. Our core temperature had fallen. In addition we had taken almost a pint of coolish beer and put it into our stomachs. No wonder we were cold. ?Just sit it out lads, it will pass eventually.?

This has always happened to me (my temperature control is rubbish) - not abnormally cold coming out of the cave, or out of the sea, getting changed and feeling OK, then half an hour later sitting in the warm with a cup of coffee in front of me feeling totally chilled inside and finding it impossible to warm up. I'd worked out the explanation, but it's good to have it confirmed - thanks for posting  (y)
 

Pegasus

Administrator
Staff member
Well you learn something new everyday as they say....explains why I've sat in a warm pub and been freezing cold for ages after caving....

Fab first post Dregson, thank you - and welcome to the forum  (y)  (y)
 

Pegasus

Administrator
Staff member
Currently a 7:1 chance of winning a Rab jacket  :eek:

Thanks to those who have posted - some great reads above  (y)

Still plenty of time for folks to enter and support the UKC competitions  ;)

Remember, winner chosen at random so you've a very good chance of winning!!

 
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