cap n chris
Well-known member
OK, so the "What's your scariest etc. experience" question has been asked. Now perhaps it's time to ask "What's the most hilarious experience you've had while caving?".
Changing back into our clothes after an aborted trip to P8 in a wintery white-out; stood in the layby, asses out; the distant sound of an approaching car hastened the need to get into trousers only to find that our damp neoprene socks had actually frozen to the tarmac. It would be an understatement to say there was a degree of panic followed by some mild embarrassment - not that there was "much" to see, mind. (You had to be there - more a visual gag than anything).
5-up in an Austin Metro (driving back from aborted trip to P8 - same day - `cos the entrance was frozen solid) driving like Colin McRae in zero vis down Winnats Pass with a bleary eyed driver toking on a doobie with me (plus two others and all our kit wedged in the back) suggesting that slower speeds on approaching corners might be wise (I think I was screaming). (Funny in retrospect.. we lived!).
Visiting Goatchurch Cavern with a caving Guru (who'd not been there for a while); at the bottom of Giants' Staircase the Guru slipped on the mirror-like path and clouted his helmet a corker on the ground and bit his tongue severely (not off, mercifully). There followed the now-legendary comment, "I didn't wealize it woth that thslippy". :wink:
The time when I had to take some "seasoned cavers" :roll: to a well known pretty cave on Eastern Mendip with a concrete tubular entrance; after unlocking the gate the screaming began and continued apace. On enquiring of the problem I was assured that no-one was going anywhere until the tiny slug ahead had been removed. `Blimey, whatever next?' I thought. Two yards later and the whole situation restarted, only the screaming was now hysterical. This time?... a spider. This was going to be a long, noisy trip, I remembered thinking to myself. (I was right, it was).
Changing back into our clothes after an aborted trip to P8 in a wintery white-out; stood in the layby, asses out; the distant sound of an approaching car hastened the need to get into trousers only to find that our damp neoprene socks had actually frozen to the tarmac. It would be an understatement to say there was a degree of panic followed by some mild embarrassment - not that there was "much" to see, mind. (You had to be there - more a visual gag than anything).
5-up in an Austin Metro (driving back from aborted trip to P8 - same day - `cos the entrance was frozen solid) driving like Colin McRae in zero vis down Winnats Pass with a bleary eyed driver toking on a doobie with me (plus two others and all our kit wedged in the back) suggesting that slower speeds on approaching corners might be wise (I think I was screaming). (Funny in retrospect.. we lived!).
Visiting Goatchurch Cavern with a caving Guru (who'd not been there for a while); at the bottom of Giants' Staircase the Guru slipped on the mirror-like path and clouted his helmet a corker on the ground and bit his tongue severely (not off, mercifully). There followed the now-legendary comment, "I didn't wealize it woth that thslippy". :wink:
The time when I had to take some "seasoned cavers" :roll: to a well known pretty cave on Eastern Mendip with a concrete tubular entrance; after unlocking the gate the screaming began and continued apace. On enquiring of the problem I was assured that no-one was going anywhere until the tiny slug ahead had been removed. `Blimey, whatever next?' I thought. Two yards later and the whole situation restarted, only the screaming was now hysterical. This time?... a spider. This was going to be a long, noisy trip, I remembered thinking to myself. (I was right, it was).