ImperialCollegecaver
Member
12th February 2017
After an epic Top Sink to Mistral traverse on the Saturday, Rhys and I have a crack at Washfold, a cave new to both of us, while the rest of the group head to the altogether more popular Alum
The muscles around my shoulder blades ached abominably on Sunday morning. The night before, caving options around Alum Pot were discussed and seeing as everybody was up for going underground again I looked for neighbouring caves I hadn?t visited before. Washfold was one such, and the description from NFTFH had a conspicuous dearth of superlatives such as ?very tight? or ?extremely wet?. Instead, Washfold is probably the only cave described there as ?uncomplicated?. That was good enough for me?
Rhys thought he?d come with me since Jack led the luminous Alum team, so we drove off towards Selside farm, where Herr Konduktor parked first in the middle of a deep puddle and second onto a soft muddy verge, sputtering to a halt as he lost the traction. Again, that was good enough for me.
Outside, the wind was howling and there was moisture in the cold air. Once changed, and therefore invicible, Rhys and I walked up the hill, past the Long Churn entrances and along the top of the scar to the north where Washfold was. With the use of GPS, the entrance was quickly located. It was a fenced off little shakehole, not far from the stone walls. Underneath our feet, several holes led down to a small stream passage.
Tucking the GPS under a tuft of grass in a tupperware box, we adjusted our bags, SRT kits packed inside and climbed down to the stream, which we followed to a large calcite obstruction where the passage turns 180? to the left. We had to climb up to the roof bedding plane, squeeze through the opening and climb back down the steps of the calcite flowstone to the enlarging streamway.
I then carried down at stream level for another downclimb, mostly using friction against the scalloped passage walls to land on a churning pool of water. A white jet of water sprayed the darkness beyond, falling with a deep, thunderous rumble. This I then assumed was the large, first pitch, and Rhys, looking ahead from a higher level of the rift spotted the traverse bolts.
I clambered back up to the ledge where he sat and we put our SRT kit on. The first anchor was a rusty D-ring type, but we couldn?t see any other artificial anchors for the traverse continuation. There was a large rock bollard 3 metres in the rift at roof level, so securing the rope to the ring, I dived in, wrapped a sling around the natural, rounded the corner and then saw the DMM anchors, protruding from the roof. At the far end, in a little alcove overlooking the 40m drop, were the bolts for the Y-hang. Once rigged, I abseiled slowly, looking for the deviation anchors that would provide a drier descent, found them, and whizzed down. It was more than good enough!
At the base of the pitch, the draught and chill were palpable, so I walked downstream for ten metres, waiting for Rhys to join me and carry on the exploration. He was soon down. We were both enjoying the moment, the new cave, the simplicity of the pitch, Yorkshire caving at its best! Further downstream, the stream passage gave way to a decorated rift, with ?memorable? climbs down angular flakes. Thankfully, there was a rope for the first 11m climb down, which we descended, but the next was unprotected and we were not happy with going down freestyle or otherwise. I carried on traversing for a little while at a well decorated level, marked by an undercut beneath the rift walls where a grey and ochre mud formation had weathered more rapidly than the surrounding limestone. Many other caves have this ?stratum? : Little Hull, at the bottom of the big pitch sprang to mind, Easegill too, just above the level of Main Drain.
The way out was relatively uneventful, that is, until the very last climb out of the cave where, losing my footing as I was passing a bag up to a ledge, I slipped down to stream level (2m below). I was unhurt: Rhys had quickly sprang into action and spotted me, but there was an easier way up which he scouted afterwards: the middle of the three holes leading to the stream.
Outside, the world was turning white, as large snowflaked fell on the moors, blanketing the flanks of Ingleborough. Arriving at Long Churn entrances, we quickly sought the relative warmth of the cave, where we picked up Diss before making a break for the minibus. There we had great fun watching a novice caver struggle with their wellies for twenty minutes, then with their central maillon and finally with their oversuit. Much to our amusement, their mentor jumped out of the car and yanked the oversuit by the collar with one brisk move, as if they were skinning a rabbit.
In time, the rest of the Alum team emerged from the mists, followed by a couple of bedraggled hikers who asked for a lift back to Ingleton; we agreed, having two spare seats left and drove back in time for tea and medals, or rather reheated but ever more scrumptious risotto.
We vowed to return to Washfold, as it was a nice day out, but we?ll bring more ropes to protect the free-climbs and make our way to the sump.
After an epic Top Sink to Mistral traverse on the Saturday, Rhys and I have a crack at Washfold, a cave new to both of us, while the rest of the group head to the altogether more popular Alum
The muscles around my shoulder blades ached abominably on Sunday morning. The night before, caving options around Alum Pot were discussed and seeing as everybody was up for going underground again I looked for neighbouring caves I hadn?t visited before. Washfold was one such, and the description from NFTFH had a conspicuous dearth of superlatives such as ?very tight? or ?extremely wet?. Instead, Washfold is probably the only cave described there as ?uncomplicated?. That was good enough for me?
Rhys thought he?d come with me since Jack led the luminous Alum team, so we drove off towards Selside farm, where Herr Konduktor parked first in the middle of a deep puddle and second onto a soft muddy verge, sputtering to a halt as he lost the traction. Again, that was good enough for me.
Outside, the wind was howling and there was moisture in the cold air. Once changed, and therefore invicible, Rhys and I walked up the hill, past the Long Churn entrances and along the top of the scar to the north where Washfold was. With the use of GPS, the entrance was quickly located. It was a fenced off little shakehole, not far from the stone walls. Underneath our feet, several holes led down to a small stream passage.
Tucking the GPS under a tuft of grass in a tupperware box, we adjusted our bags, SRT kits packed inside and climbed down to the stream, which we followed to a large calcite obstruction where the passage turns 180? to the left. We had to climb up to the roof bedding plane, squeeze through the opening and climb back down the steps of the calcite flowstone to the enlarging streamway.
I then carried down at stream level for another downclimb, mostly using friction against the scalloped passage walls to land on a churning pool of water. A white jet of water sprayed the darkness beyond, falling with a deep, thunderous rumble. This I then assumed was the large, first pitch, and Rhys, looking ahead from a higher level of the rift spotted the traverse bolts.
I clambered back up to the ledge where he sat and we put our SRT kit on. The first anchor was a rusty D-ring type, but we couldn?t see any other artificial anchors for the traverse continuation. There was a large rock bollard 3 metres in the rift at roof level, so securing the rope to the ring, I dived in, wrapped a sling around the natural, rounded the corner and then saw the DMM anchors, protruding from the roof. At the far end, in a little alcove overlooking the 40m drop, were the bolts for the Y-hang. Once rigged, I abseiled slowly, looking for the deviation anchors that would provide a drier descent, found them, and whizzed down. It was more than good enough!
At the base of the pitch, the draught and chill were palpable, so I walked downstream for ten metres, waiting for Rhys to join me and carry on the exploration. He was soon down. We were both enjoying the moment, the new cave, the simplicity of the pitch, Yorkshire caving at its best! Further downstream, the stream passage gave way to a decorated rift, with ?memorable? climbs down angular flakes. Thankfully, there was a rope for the first 11m climb down, which we descended, but the next was unprotected and we were not happy with going down freestyle or otherwise. I carried on traversing for a little while at a well decorated level, marked by an undercut beneath the rift walls where a grey and ochre mud formation had weathered more rapidly than the surrounding limestone. Many other caves have this ?stratum? : Little Hull, at the bottom of the big pitch sprang to mind, Easegill too, just above the level of Main Drain.
The way out was relatively uneventful, that is, until the very last climb out of the cave where, losing my footing as I was passing a bag up to a ledge, I slipped down to stream level (2m below). I was unhurt: Rhys had quickly sprang into action and spotted me, but there was an easier way up which he scouted afterwards: the middle of the three holes leading to the stream.
Outside, the world was turning white, as large snowflaked fell on the moors, blanketing the flanks of Ingleborough. Arriving at Long Churn entrances, we quickly sought the relative warmth of the cave, where we picked up Diss before making a break for the minibus. There we had great fun watching a novice caver struggle with their wellies for twenty minutes, then with their central maillon and finally with their oversuit. Much to our amusement, their mentor jumped out of the car and yanked the oversuit by the collar with one brisk move, as if they were skinning a rabbit.
In time, the rest of the Alum team emerged from the mists, followed by a couple of bedraggled hikers who asked for a lift back to Ingleton; we agreed, having two spare seats left and drove back in time for tea and medals, or rather reheated but ever more scrumptious risotto.
We vowed to return to Washfold, as it was a nice day out, but we?ll bring more ropes to protect the free-climbs and make our way to the sump.
