Date: 12/11/2017
Cave: Illusion Pot
People: Kristian Brook, Luke Stangroom, Nasibah Azhari, Kal Longford, Andrew Rowlands, Tony Cook, Sam Higg, me
When Kristian asked me whether I preferred to go to a pretty cave or a 'ropey' cave during Friday's training, it took me a minute to decide. Had I known that the pretty cave he had in mind was Illusion pot, I probably wouldn't have thought it twice.
So there we went on Sunday. Such a beautiful day for caving! After the usual stop at Ingleton, we headed for Kingsdale, probably one of the most beautiful spots I have seen in the Yorkshire Dales so far. Once there, Tony Cook, an ULSA alumni member, joined us and we split into two groups, as one was going to Simpsons and the other to Illusion Pot.
Finally, we set out for the cave. The day was so nice and the landscape so beautiful that we almost didn't mind taking a long roundabout route instead of going right to the entrance. We had begun to think that we were hiking instead of caving when we saw a fully operative ice cream van a few hundred meters ahead of us in the path. It was so in the middle of nowhere that we thought Kristian was actually taking us there for ice cream, but it turns out that he wasn't, he had just forgot the way to the entrance of the cave.
After some more hiking, climbing up a nearby hill and climbing it down again, we finally found the entrance of the cave and there we went. It was a pretty easy cave, but absolutely worth the visit. The main challenges we found (if they can be called that, after what we have seen/done in other caves) were a long crawl through a not very wide passage, a tricky though short climb down (and up again on our way back) and a duck that was almost a sump on our way in (Kristian and Tony bailed a lot of water out (and on us) on our way out). There was also a transverse line (that was rigged very loosely and only some of us took) that led to a muddy ramp and down to a sump.
I think this is the most beautiful cave I have been to so far (I haven't been to many, to be honest). The calcite formations took all sorts of fanciful shapes and colors, from very interesting wax-looking structures to bright orange and pointy carrot-like stalactites, from very thin long white straws to flag-like colorful striped sheets. It was also very interesting to see the effects of water flows: in some chambers, the stalactites were covered in mud, thus indicating that that part of the cave gets completely flooded sometimes (also that there are not any strong currents whenever that happens, or the delicate straws would have broken long ago); in others, there were huge mud deposits that were obviously transported and shaped by water.
We managed to get out of the cave before sunset just to find out it was much warmer inside it. All in all, a very nice day trip for most of us (Rachel had to do part of their cave twice because Max forgot his light down there, so maybe she thinks differently). It was one of the first caving trips for some people (like Kat or Andrew) and I think it was a very good choice of a cave. Many thanks to Tony, who filmed the team that finally connected Illusion Pot and Dale Barn 4, for all the interesting stories and facts about the cave, they made the trip even more interesting.
* Photos by Andrew Rowlands:
(2) by Andrew Rowlands
(1) by Andrew Rowlands
(3) by Andrew Rowlands
(5) by Andrew Rowlands
(8) by Andrew Rowlands
Cave: Illusion Pot
People: Kristian Brook, Luke Stangroom, Nasibah Azhari, Kal Longford, Andrew Rowlands, Tony Cook, Sam Higg, me
When Kristian asked me whether I preferred to go to a pretty cave or a 'ropey' cave during Friday's training, it took me a minute to decide. Had I known that the pretty cave he had in mind was Illusion pot, I probably wouldn't have thought it twice.
So there we went on Sunday. Such a beautiful day for caving! After the usual stop at Ingleton, we headed for Kingsdale, probably one of the most beautiful spots I have seen in the Yorkshire Dales so far. Once there, Tony Cook, an ULSA alumni member, joined us and we split into two groups, as one was going to Simpsons and the other to Illusion Pot.
Finally, we set out for the cave. The day was so nice and the landscape so beautiful that we almost didn't mind taking a long roundabout route instead of going right to the entrance. We had begun to think that we were hiking instead of caving when we saw a fully operative ice cream van a few hundred meters ahead of us in the path. It was so in the middle of nowhere that we thought Kristian was actually taking us there for ice cream, but it turns out that he wasn't, he had just forgot the way to the entrance of the cave.
After some more hiking, climbing up a nearby hill and climbing it down again, we finally found the entrance of the cave and there we went. It was a pretty easy cave, but absolutely worth the visit. The main challenges we found (if they can be called that, after what we have seen/done in other caves) were a long crawl through a not very wide passage, a tricky though short climb down (and up again on our way back) and a duck that was almost a sump on our way in (Kristian and Tony bailed a lot of water out (and on us) on our way out). There was also a transverse line (that was rigged very loosely and only some of us took) that led to a muddy ramp and down to a sump.
I think this is the most beautiful cave I have been to so far (I haven't been to many, to be honest). The calcite formations took all sorts of fanciful shapes and colors, from very interesting wax-looking structures to bright orange and pointy carrot-like stalactites, from very thin long white straws to flag-like colorful striped sheets. It was also very interesting to see the effects of water flows: in some chambers, the stalactites were covered in mud, thus indicating that that part of the cave gets completely flooded sometimes (also that there are not any strong currents whenever that happens, or the delicate straws would have broken long ago); in others, there were huge mud deposits that were obviously transported and shaped by water.
We managed to get out of the cave before sunset just to find out it was much warmer inside it. All in all, a very nice day trip for most of us (Rachel had to do part of their cave twice because Max forgot his light down there, so maybe she thinks differently). It was one of the first caving trips for some people (like Kat or Andrew) and I think it was a very good choice of a cave. Many thanks to Tony, who filmed the team that finally connected Illusion Pot and Dale Barn 4, for all the interesting stories and facts about the cave, they made the trip even more interesting.
* Photos by Andrew Rowlands:
(2) by Andrew Rowlands
(1) by Andrew Rowlands
(3) by Andrew Rowlands
(5) by Andrew Rowlands
(8) by Andrew Rowlands