13 years old: too young to join a caving club?

[buckdenbill]

I'm only 15, and although having not yet joined a proper club - have been exploring slate mines since about the age of 7. As the others say - it is possible, but adult supervision is sometimes required.

cheers;
Linden

 

[cap n chris]

Your grasp of grammar, punctuation and spelling makes me wonder whether you are really as young as that! - unless, of course, you're a foreign student in which case that would clearly explain everything.

Many adult contributors to this forum seem barely capable of constructing a coherent word, let alone a sentence.

 

[Brains]

Many adult contributors to this forum seem barely capable of constructing a coherent word, let alone a sentence.

Please dont exclude yourself, there is more to it than spelling and grammer to make sense... No offence intended of course!

 

[cap n chris]

Absotastico.

BTW, welcome to the madness, Burkendonhill.

 

[mrodoc]

I started caving aged 14 with my father and younger sister. By the age of 16 I had graduated to trips to Swildons 2. We then took my 13 year old cousin Mandy caving including a trip to Stoke 2. A friend said she would burn herself out! She ended up joining the Bradford and bottoming the Berger. She then becamie a top class rock climber apparently although I haven't seen her for years.

A recommendation is that you do easy but complex caves first eg Holwell, Goatchurch, Swildons Upper Series and develop your route finding skills. Don't be afraid to buy and use a survey as it will greatly increase your enjoyment and understanding of the cave.  Too many so called experience cavers have serious problems route finding.

PS As afifteen year old I was one year off O level English and the quote about a 15 year old being unlikely to be able to write coherent English shows the decline in standards over the years.

An old fart writes!

 

[RobinGriffiths]

ttexla, I don't know where you're based, but if you're ever up in the dales, you're welcome to come on a trip with me and my daughter - she's 6 1/2 and has done about a dozen caving trips. Send me a PM if you and your lad are about and we'll sort something out.

Which caves have you done. My son's 6 and I'm thinking of taking him up to the Dales this summer.

Robin

 

[j4nny]

i started caving through a school trip to burrington, aged 11 i think. loved it, carried on. at 16 the club i had joined treated me to my own petzl zoom, (though i did the the man in 'Dragon Supplies' to change the strap to purple as that kind of thing was important at the time) over the years i have been involved with many 'kids trips' but find these days people are wary because of the child protection issues as well as missunderstandings about insurance. if a youngster in my care falls and i grab them to stop them injuring them self, am i touching them without there permission- breaching some kind of child protection law? personally i would not question and do what had to be done to keep everyone safe, but i have herd this discussion among cavers as a reason not to take young people. worries about what the repercussions might be of the story being told to someone who takes the scenario completely the wrong way.funnily enough, more so with the male cavers than with the girlie's - i maybe wrong but i get the impression that blokes are more cautious of exposing them self to this kind of thing. sad really, cos if we don't encourage more young cavers where will the next generation come from?

 

[Rachel]

ttexla, I don't know where you're based, but if you're ever up in the dales, you're welcome to come on a trip with me and my daughter - she's 6 1/2 and has done about a dozen caving trips. Send me a PM if you and your lad are about and we'll sort something out.

Which caves have you done. My son's 6 and I'm thinking of taking him up to the Dales this summer.

Robin

hi Robin,
We've done Valley Entrance a few times (sliding down the oildrum at least a dozen times before making any further progress), Yordas, Thistle, Runscar, Roger Kirk, Katnot, Birkwith, Old Ing, Calf Holes to Browgill, Great Douk, Long Churn, Gaping Gill at the winch meet. The next one we've got coming up is Heron next month. We're also planning to have a girly adventure up at GG this year. I missed it altogether last year, so it'll be a treat for both of us. The BPC seem to have a lot of very young cavers at the moment - possibly something to do with my generation getting older! You'd be very welcome to join us when you're up in the Dales.
Rachel

 

[martinb]

Having just got back into caving after experiencing a few holes in the '80's, I took my son -aged 10 - last weekend to Stoney Middleton and did Bossen Hole and a little bit of Carlswark.

He's been nagging me all week asking when the next trip is......so back to Stoney M on Sunday and a lot more of Carlswark....... 8)

However, now my 15 year daughter wants to know when I'm taking her......Soooo yet more kit to buy...

Martin