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After finally being able to sit back and take a breather from what has been a full on 6 days of cave and cave related shenanigans, my lack of trip reports has left me feeling like an errant schoolkid and has led to me being told off more than once so far! So to right this wrong and in keeping with tradition I will endeavour to give a fair and partially accurate account of the last week or so! (the sober bits at least). If you aren't a fan of long winded trip reports then please consider the abridged version below.
If I was to sum up in one word not only the week but also all of the events that I took part in throughout, then it would be "understated"; from the serene and impressive tours of Shute Shelf and Carcass cave, to dropping down virgin mine shafts, a sporting trip in goatchurch packed with complacency and lack of gear, or the finale being the absolute caving epiphany that was Hidden Earth.
Tuesday 18/09/07
Shute Shelf Cavern and Carcass cave
Attending; Alan from the Axbridge, Andy Snook and Darkplaces
I'd been looking forward to doing this trip for a whole week, and so right on cue the day I was due to go I came down with a massive cold and was also invited round a nice young ladies house for a bottle of wine. Clearly this was a sign and so I did what any red blooded male with a heavy case of man flu would do, I got in my car and set off to go caving, admittedly I was sniffling and yes I was having some minor regrets but they soon faded when I got into the Mendips.
After meeting up at the lay by we set about heading towards Shute cavern, there was no complaining about the walk up the hill as none of us could spare any breath to talk and so after an arduous walk it was wonderful to crawl into what turned out to be very comfortable and easy cave.
Alan was superb in that he gave us the history and showed us all the details but not as a routine or in some form of script but rather with a passion that can only come from really liking a place and a familiarity that probably came from a long time spent digging in it.
Andy and myself checked out various passageways, like the not so nightmarish Elm Street and a brief look up pit prop passage revealed some props that had come to look more like chocolate sponge rather than structural support; on the way out I got to stick my head in a geode that was very similar to the one i saw in Kings mine, with the same crystalline spike protrusions on every inch of the cavity.
Carcass cave was the first cave I have ever seen to have its own partial infrastructure, and so following a monorail down into a cave certainly held some novelty with us, my illusions of riding it down for fun were quickly shattered upon discovering that it dropped down into a 60 foot shaft that was spanned by temples and mounted with ladders.
We climbed down and had a look at the dig site before heading back up, my cold was on overdrive now and with both caves being quite warm I was starting to get pretty tired and fatigued; we exited into the cool night air and were instantly savaged by a cloud of seething bugs, so we all turned our lights off and pointed them towards the moon. Hanging around with Alan for too long might prove to be dangerous however as I was starting to get a bit of dig fever just listening to him relate tales of digs past and present, not sure I am ready to wallow in muddy hell just yet!
Wednesday 19/09/07
BGG mine shaft one and two
Attending; Les, fifty fifty Les and Bean
Whilst we broke through into new passage last week, we weren't going anywhere due to numerous remarks from Bean about the state of the shaft and the problem of getting out once he had gotten in. So this time we returned with extra ladders and a pantin just in case, Bean was straight down it and after descending the 30 foot or so of natural entrance rift he squeezed through the tight horizontal slot while I waited at the bottom to belay his ladder with my foot, after dropping down the new part of the shaft he promptly discovered it wouldn't go any further without digging and so we decided to go and check out yet another shaft that had appeared in a field nearby. After urban surfing and opening cattle gates on the side of Les's landrover and wondering what I had done with the last 26 years of my life to find this kind of thing so alien and yet so much fun, we arrived at our next shaft.
The farmer described it as a "rabbit hole" but this would only be accurate if the rabbit that dug it had been fed a diet of nitrous oxide and anabolic steroids, upon lifting the six foot gate that covered the hole we peered down into a very neat shaft that was about 30 foot deep and about 3 foot wide all around.
After we did the classic landrover and ladder belay and me being dead-keen with preference to the 'keen' part, I headed down the shaft with a few stops to talk absolute crap about old bottles and strange bones and then upon finding a milk churn proceeded to rant about that as well. The shaft was absolutely filled with debris at the bottom and even more crap was brought down (stopping briefly at my head on the way) with the arrival of Bean who came down to give a second opinion.
It was a nice shaft but we decided the most likely one to dig was going to be the first one and so feeling a bit spoilt at talk of yet MORE possibilities to check out, we set off for a well earned pint, with muggins being on gate opening and closing duty once again (it was less fun this time as it was now pissing it down).
Thursday 20/09/07
Goatchurch
Attending; Darren and fifty fifty Les
The original plan was to go to Lionel's for a bit of caving with Anne and Hughie, however due to a late start and a massive drop out rate we ended up having to go with plan B which was Goatchurch, I have never been and thinking the Lionel's trip was all but gone we set off for the cave. On the drive down I spotted Anne and co and jumped out of the car to make my excuses, where upon she immediately tried to drag me down Lionel's; shouting our apologies I dived back into the car and we parked up at the cafe.
Darren had been to Goatchurch once ("but I'm not sure I can remember much") regardless he was instantly elevated to leader status; whilst kitting up there was a slight tone of complacency as I had decided to leave my kneepads and boots behind, which meant I was going to head down in a boiler suit with my work shoes on, it was after all Goatchurch.
We finally found the cave entrance and the first thing I noticed was that I had to slide along the floor in places because standing up would have been like skating on ice, the cave had been worn and polished by innumerable novices and provided an interesting bit of fun as we skidded about the place. I was mad keen on doing the drainpipe and so we slid our way down to it and I peered into the murky depths. I have to confess that it looked a little foreboding but after a bit of thought I threw myself down it and it might even have been fun if I was wearing something more substantial than my imaginary kneepads once again!
We quickly got to the other side and had a nosey around various rocks and alcoves before heading back along the pipe and up and out.....eventually. Some of the climbs out were comical to say the least and the climb up Tradesmans entrance looked like a masochistic version of dancing on ice, next time I'll bring my boots then.
Darren clearly relished the role of leader and even went so far as to make bits up for our benefit ("this is the part of the cave that they surveyed for ammo storage in the first world war") and he even got us out in time for the pub . Cheers mate, had a blast!
Friday 21st
Hidden Earth day one
Attending; The troglodyte nation
Being new to all of this I have no real expectations other than what I read about or have been told and as caving is relatively incomparable to anything else I have thus far encountered in life, it is fair to say that my expectations are constantly being exceeded and at times literally sent into orbit. Hidden Earth was understated, when I set off on Friday I was expecting a great conference and beer and that was definitely there, but by the end of it all I had a completely new view on caving, the national and international community, just what constitutes a hard caver, and mans ability to dance even after imbibing perhaps his own body weight in Potholer.
It didn't start so well though (although it made a brilliant photo) with Les, myself and Des in the van and Ed W following behind we found ourselves in a Bristol industrial estate with nothing but time and bad language as the van battery had died and we weren't going to be starting it in a hurry. There was a brief comedy interlude in the midst of all this bad news in the form of Ed W trying to duct tape the back of his car back together after reversing a little too far into a wall and giving it a bricks and mortar makeover. The biggest irony was that we were parked about 100 metres from the RAC HQ and none of us were members, anyhow it all got sorted and we were on the road fairly soon after with a new battery and we could use the radio once more!
When we got to Hidden Earth I brought shame to myself by spending over an hour trying to pitch my bloody tent, it was a complete farce and people were actually pointing and laughing (you know who you are), when I had finally got it sorted (with a little help) I went to assist the others in setting up for the conference and you can imagine my surprise when upon asking what I could do to help, I got handed the plans for two 10 by 5 metre gazebos.... GIANT TENTS!. I may well have been the wrong man for the job but after 5 minutes the power had gone to my head and I had various members of the Kendal scurrying round helping (they did most of the work, cheers folks!).
Anyhow I was starting to get an idea of the grand scale of all this and already there were a lot of people congregating, fairly soon after most of the major work was done I found myself in the bar and managed to get so drunk I couldn't even get into my sleeping bag, waking up a good 4 foot away from it the next morning!
Saturday 22nd;
Day two
I can't remember much about Saturday because I started drinking after breakfast, Biff and myself had a go at teching in theatre three and imposed an ad-hoc dress code which started off with no shorts and ended up with no hats, neutral colours only and no shoes! Such power came with great responsibility however and at one point Biff had to press a button on a panel and I had to turn a light off (all this teching was hard work!)
We all rushed off for the Mendip roundup which was hilarious and then I did some Sherpa duties and beer imbibing before we all prepped for the dinner. It was great to meet so many people and I found that if I stood in any one spot for anything longer than five minutes I managed to meet someone new and strike up a conversation, at the heart of everything everyone there was attending due to a relation to whatever degree, with caving. So all the icebreaking was done and it was great to have common ground with people of all ages, backgrounds and nations.
I ended up getting drunk and watching the Mendip formation dance duo communicate in the medium that is drunken dance, which was absolutely brilliant and J-Rat is a legendary sport!
Day three;
I got up and decided because I had heard people talk about Matienzo I would go along and see what it was all about. I love the idea of exploration and uncharted mysteries, I get excited just peering behind stacks of deads in old mines and so when the multitudes of un-dropped holes, un-pushed cave and barely dug passages in Matienzo came to my attention it is understandable that I nearly fell off my chair. Needless to say I will be going to Matienzo come hell or high water next year (high water is possible I'm told) and my horizons are now widened beyond belief, brilliant presentation!
The entire conference was filled with great presentations and I felt like I had even learned a few things by the end of it, after an absolutely hilarious presentation by Scoff and Ryall the closing ceremony shortly followed and with the theatre in hysterics the conference was closed with a video by Sid Perou.
It wouldn't have been right if we didn't break down on the way home too and so after a bit of debating we had an interesting journey back, in convoy.
There was more beer and in the morning a cracking breakfast courtesy of Wendy, in all a great weekend and a great end to a seven day blur of underground activities.
Hidden Earth was superb and understated, even though I knew it was big, I didn't realise quite how big, it almost seemed to run with a degree of autonomy but that was simply because of how well prepared and experienced everyone involved in the organisation and running of it was, there was a ton of work put into it and everyone still seemed to have a fantastic time throughout.
Thanks to everyone for a superb conference and a brilliant week!
If I was to sum up in one word not only the week but also all of the events that I took part in throughout, then it would be "understated"; from the serene and impressive tours of Shute Shelf and Carcass cave, to dropping down virgin mine shafts, a sporting trip in goatchurch packed with complacency and lack of gear, or the finale being the absolute caving epiphany that was Hidden Earth.
Tuesday 18/09/07
Shute Shelf Cavern and Carcass cave
Attending; Alan from the Axbridge, Andy Snook and Darkplaces
I'd been looking forward to doing this trip for a whole week, and so right on cue the day I was due to go I came down with a massive cold and was also invited round a nice young ladies house for a bottle of wine. Clearly this was a sign and so I did what any red blooded male with a heavy case of man flu would do, I got in my car and set off to go caving, admittedly I was sniffling and yes I was having some minor regrets but they soon faded when I got into the Mendips.
After meeting up at the lay by we set about heading towards Shute cavern, there was no complaining about the walk up the hill as none of us could spare any breath to talk and so after an arduous walk it was wonderful to crawl into what turned out to be very comfortable and easy cave.
Alan was superb in that he gave us the history and showed us all the details but not as a routine or in some form of script but rather with a passion that can only come from really liking a place and a familiarity that probably came from a long time spent digging in it.
Andy and myself checked out various passageways, like the not so nightmarish Elm Street and a brief look up pit prop passage revealed some props that had come to look more like chocolate sponge rather than structural support; on the way out I got to stick my head in a geode that was very similar to the one i saw in Kings mine, with the same crystalline spike protrusions on every inch of the cavity.
Carcass cave was the first cave I have ever seen to have its own partial infrastructure, and so following a monorail down into a cave certainly held some novelty with us, my illusions of riding it down for fun were quickly shattered upon discovering that it dropped down into a 60 foot shaft that was spanned by temples and mounted with ladders.
We climbed down and had a look at the dig site before heading back up, my cold was on overdrive now and with both caves being quite warm I was starting to get pretty tired and fatigued; we exited into the cool night air and were instantly savaged by a cloud of seething bugs, so we all turned our lights off and pointed them towards the moon. Hanging around with Alan for too long might prove to be dangerous however as I was starting to get a bit of dig fever just listening to him relate tales of digs past and present, not sure I am ready to wallow in muddy hell just yet!
Wednesday 19/09/07
BGG mine shaft one and two
Attending; Les, fifty fifty Les and Bean
Whilst we broke through into new passage last week, we weren't going anywhere due to numerous remarks from Bean about the state of the shaft and the problem of getting out once he had gotten in. So this time we returned with extra ladders and a pantin just in case, Bean was straight down it and after descending the 30 foot or so of natural entrance rift he squeezed through the tight horizontal slot while I waited at the bottom to belay his ladder with my foot, after dropping down the new part of the shaft he promptly discovered it wouldn't go any further without digging and so we decided to go and check out yet another shaft that had appeared in a field nearby. After urban surfing and opening cattle gates on the side of Les's landrover and wondering what I had done with the last 26 years of my life to find this kind of thing so alien and yet so much fun, we arrived at our next shaft.
The farmer described it as a "rabbit hole" but this would only be accurate if the rabbit that dug it had been fed a diet of nitrous oxide and anabolic steroids, upon lifting the six foot gate that covered the hole we peered down into a very neat shaft that was about 30 foot deep and about 3 foot wide all around.
After we did the classic landrover and ladder belay and me being dead-keen with preference to the 'keen' part, I headed down the shaft with a few stops to talk absolute crap about old bottles and strange bones and then upon finding a milk churn proceeded to rant about that as well. The shaft was absolutely filled with debris at the bottom and even more crap was brought down (stopping briefly at my head on the way) with the arrival of Bean who came down to give a second opinion.
It was a nice shaft but we decided the most likely one to dig was going to be the first one and so feeling a bit spoilt at talk of yet MORE possibilities to check out, we set off for a well earned pint, with muggins being on gate opening and closing duty once again (it was less fun this time as it was now pissing it down).
Thursday 20/09/07
Goatchurch
Attending; Darren and fifty fifty Les
The original plan was to go to Lionel's for a bit of caving with Anne and Hughie, however due to a late start and a massive drop out rate we ended up having to go with plan B which was Goatchurch, I have never been and thinking the Lionel's trip was all but gone we set off for the cave. On the drive down I spotted Anne and co and jumped out of the car to make my excuses, where upon she immediately tried to drag me down Lionel's; shouting our apologies I dived back into the car and we parked up at the cafe.
Darren had been to Goatchurch once ("but I'm not sure I can remember much") regardless he was instantly elevated to leader status; whilst kitting up there was a slight tone of complacency as I had decided to leave my kneepads and boots behind, which meant I was going to head down in a boiler suit with my work shoes on, it was after all Goatchurch.
We finally found the cave entrance and the first thing I noticed was that I had to slide along the floor in places because standing up would have been like skating on ice, the cave had been worn and polished by innumerable novices and provided an interesting bit of fun as we skidded about the place. I was mad keen on doing the drainpipe and so we slid our way down to it and I peered into the murky depths. I have to confess that it looked a little foreboding but after a bit of thought I threw myself down it and it might even have been fun if I was wearing something more substantial than my imaginary kneepads once again!
We quickly got to the other side and had a nosey around various rocks and alcoves before heading back along the pipe and up and out.....eventually. Some of the climbs out were comical to say the least and the climb up Tradesmans entrance looked like a masochistic version of dancing on ice, next time I'll bring my boots then.
Darren clearly relished the role of leader and even went so far as to make bits up for our benefit ("this is the part of the cave that they surveyed for ammo storage in the first world war") and he even got us out in time for the pub . Cheers mate, had a blast!
Friday 21st
Hidden Earth day one
Attending; The troglodyte nation
Being new to all of this I have no real expectations other than what I read about or have been told and as caving is relatively incomparable to anything else I have thus far encountered in life, it is fair to say that my expectations are constantly being exceeded and at times literally sent into orbit. Hidden Earth was understated, when I set off on Friday I was expecting a great conference and beer and that was definitely there, but by the end of it all I had a completely new view on caving, the national and international community, just what constitutes a hard caver, and mans ability to dance even after imbibing perhaps his own body weight in Potholer.
It didn't start so well though (although it made a brilliant photo) with Les, myself and Des in the van and Ed W following behind we found ourselves in a Bristol industrial estate with nothing but time and bad language as the van battery had died and we weren't going to be starting it in a hurry. There was a brief comedy interlude in the midst of all this bad news in the form of Ed W trying to duct tape the back of his car back together after reversing a little too far into a wall and giving it a bricks and mortar makeover. The biggest irony was that we were parked about 100 metres from the RAC HQ and none of us were members, anyhow it all got sorted and we were on the road fairly soon after with a new battery and we could use the radio once more!
When we got to Hidden Earth I brought shame to myself by spending over an hour trying to pitch my bloody tent, it was a complete farce and people were actually pointing and laughing (you know who you are), when I had finally got it sorted (with a little help) I went to assist the others in setting up for the conference and you can imagine my surprise when upon asking what I could do to help, I got handed the plans for two 10 by 5 metre gazebos.... GIANT TENTS!. I may well have been the wrong man for the job but after 5 minutes the power had gone to my head and I had various members of the Kendal scurrying round helping (they did most of the work, cheers folks!).
Anyhow I was starting to get an idea of the grand scale of all this and already there were a lot of people congregating, fairly soon after most of the major work was done I found myself in the bar and managed to get so drunk I couldn't even get into my sleeping bag, waking up a good 4 foot away from it the next morning!
Saturday 22nd;
Day two
I can't remember much about Saturday because I started drinking after breakfast, Biff and myself had a go at teching in theatre three and imposed an ad-hoc dress code which started off with no shorts and ended up with no hats, neutral colours only and no shoes! Such power came with great responsibility however and at one point Biff had to press a button on a panel and I had to turn a light off (all this teching was hard work!)
We all rushed off for the Mendip roundup which was hilarious and then I did some Sherpa duties and beer imbibing before we all prepped for the dinner. It was great to meet so many people and I found that if I stood in any one spot for anything longer than five minutes I managed to meet someone new and strike up a conversation, at the heart of everything everyone there was attending due to a relation to whatever degree, with caving. So all the icebreaking was done and it was great to have common ground with people of all ages, backgrounds and nations.
I ended up getting drunk and watching the Mendip formation dance duo communicate in the medium that is drunken dance, which was absolutely brilliant and J-Rat is a legendary sport!
Day three;
I got up and decided because I had heard people talk about Matienzo I would go along and see what it was all about. I love the idea of exploration and uncharted mysteries, I get excited just peering behind stacks of deads in old mines and so when the multitudes of un-dropped holes, un-pushed cave and barely dug passages in Matienzo came to my attention it is understandable that I nearly fell off my chair. Needless to say I will be going to Matienzo come hell or high water next year (high water is possible I'm told) and my horizons are now widened beyond belief, brilliant presentation!
The entire conference was filled with great presentations and I felt like I had even learned a few things by the end of it, after an absolutely hilarious presentation by Scoff and Ryall the closing ceremony shortly followed and with the theatre in hysterics the conference was closed with a video by Sid Perou.
It wouldn't have been right if we didn't break down on the way home too and so after a bit of debating we had an interesting journey back, in convoy.
There was more beer and in the morning a cracking breakfast courtesy of Wendy, in all a great weekend and a great end to a seven day blur of underground activities.
Hidden Earth was superb and understated, even though I knew it was big, I didn't realise quite how big, it almost seemed to run with a degree of autonomy but that was simply because of how well prepared and experienced everyone involved in the organisation and running of it was, there was a ton of work put into it and everyone still seemed to have a fantastic time throughout.
Thanks to everyone for a superb conference and a brilliant week!
