A faint light illuminates the rebelay below as Rob quickly switches over and continues down. I’m sitting with my legs dangling into Cliffestyle a little apprehensive. I have descending this mine shaft twice now and both times got hung up on the free hanging rebelay, and so I lowered myself in with caution and set off. Descending 80m feels a long way down, but I was acutely aware that we would be coming back up this later on.
GETTING SUCKED OFF IN THE BOG
Before I know it I’m on the floor and had passed both rebelays with no dramas what so ever. Slipping into the squeeze and dropping into the sough Rob and I waited for Joe and set off for Victory level. Every time I have been in the sough it’s been a long ol’ slog, but tonight we took about 4 steps and turned right and headed into a level.
We started off on easy walking passage before shortly heading into the bog of doom (my name for this place). The stope was huge with wooden stemples high above us; however, trying to enjoy the view was tricky due to the fact that with every step you sunk deep into thick gloopy mud. My wellies were getting sucked off in the bog and it was becoming a bit laborious, especially in a wetsuit.
Eventually we approached the low arch and Rob got excited “OOOOOO it’s open” he said as he ducked under the lowest section. I followed; now, normally for a duck like this you tend to tip the head sideways and turn your mouth up to the ceiling and if you are lucky you only get a wet ear half a wet face. Being a bit special I just dropped my head down, I had not taken a breath properly and fully submerged my face. I was only under water for a couple of seconds but I popped up quickly gasping for air and a little embarrassed at my mistake.
THE TSG BYPASS
Walking up to our chest in water now I was very grateful for the wetsuit. “This is seriously cold water, colder than the sough” I gasped. “It’s no colder than any other cave water” Joe replied a bit none plussed. I tried to keep my hands out of the water because it was icy cold. Sometime later we got to the free dive. Rob said that we would do that on the return, but for now we will do the bypass. “Oh, the TSG bypass?” I asked playfully. Rob chuckled “No TSG has ever been here.”
We climbed up and into a rifty but before heading into a squeeze. Rob slipped through as he has the hips of an 8 year old boy. Now, I’m slim, but compared to Rob and Joe I am a fatty and as I slotted myself into the squeeze I got firmly stuck on my SRT kit. I tried sucking myself in as much as I could by my central mallion was having none of it and I’m quite attached to my gentleman sausage, so I retreated, dekitted and slid straight through.
We mooched along in a chamber trying to figure out where the streamway had gone but there was nothing obvious. I climbed up and into a slot which opened into some pipe caverns with pick marks all in the ceiling from T’owd man. Rob gave us an encyclopaedic information session on these bits of natural cave before Joe lead on.
DON’T TRUST THAT BOLT AND ITS ONLY 9MM ROPE
We descended a hand line before heading back up the other side, “You are a climber right?” Joe asked me. “Yep” I replied. “Good because there’s a really dodgy climb coming up” Rob said nervously. Before long we were stood at the base of a pitch with a black rope. This was the dodgy climb. Rob clipped his chest jammer on. Hmmm if Robs clipping on to the rope it’s a bit serious. He set off up the climb which went upwards and then diagonal and out of sight. There was a lot of grunting and various noises which made it sound awkward and hard work. “Yeah so don’t trust that bolt and thanks Joe its only 9mm Rope!” came the disembodied voice. Joe laughed before kicking a ton of mud off his wellies and began the climb in the same manner as Rob, also making it look tricky. Eventually the shout of rope free called me up. This is a million miles away from bouldering in fontainebleu in my Evolv Bandits I chuckled to myself as I emptied water from my full wellies and tried to kick some of the mud off. I set off and found it to be a really easy and really nice chimney climb. There is a bold step I guess you could call it but the holds were so good I didn’t need the rope at all.
We got to the first pitch, and a short ascent later we were in a small chamber, Joe slipped into a slot at floor level, followed by Rob and I. The boys set about starting the job of why we were here tonight, surveying the passages. I had a power nap whilst they fannied around, “Ohhhh I can connect to your disto, ooooo I can give it a name” came some nerdy simping for each other as I dozed. I could hear excitement as Roots were coming through the roof here and so we must be near to the surface. Rob felt we were below the shaft which was blocked in. As the boys surveyed back to the chamber I went into when Joe had been, “just don’t touch the big boulder” Joe warned me. I slipped through the hole to see a huge block of hanging death holding up a whole choke. I sucked myself in tight and carefully inched past the boulder into a thin passage which was the end. Totally not worth getting squished for, and so I retreated keeping a watchful eye on the boulder and joined the boys in the chamber.
Classic Joe Buck Rigging
Joe kindly let me have a go at surveying and so he would identify the station, I would lazer to that and then set splays off everywhere before moving on, we finished the chamber and then down the pitch and into the rift. I thoroughly enjoyed this and was even more fascinated when Rob showed us real time images on his phone from the disto. Ok, fair enough this is proper cave geek porn and I am here for it,
We headed to the final up pitch, and as we climbed up to the foot of it, there was the famous wheelbarrow. A pemberton photo special. This old wooden barrow rotting away looked really quite special at the far reaches of this mine that has not seen human activity for a hundred years or so.
Joe set off up the pitch first and warned us to stand back. Sure enough lots of rock came crashing down and I was grateful of the shelter. Rob went next and I followed. Within a few metres of the top it shuts down to nothing but feels close to the surface. There is a small slot that just disappears down into the blackness but Rob doesn’t feel it goes anywhere. We started surveying again. This time I was on the stations. Joe gave me the muddiest bottle of nail varnish ever and I picked the stations and blobbed little blue marks as we retreated back to the pitch. “BOOM” Came a massive bang from below us. “Was that you?” I asked Rob, thinking he had found a bigger rock to launch down the hole. “No, not me or Joe” he replied. We all looked at the world’s loosest pitch. I got on the rope and Rob started to laugh “what’s this? Classic Joe Buck rigging! Look, that’s not even taking any slack” keen not to shock load anything I gently retreated, Joe followed and we waited for Rob who said he was going to derig.
WHOOOOAAAA WATCH OUT FOR THE HANDLES
There was a loud commotion from above then boulder after boulder came down, we stepped back a bit further. Sometime later after many boulders, Rob came down the rope “yeah I chose not to do the pull through” he said with a nervous laughter. “Right let’s get a photo by this wheelbarrow, can’t be that hard if Jon can do it” Rob said stepping over. We tried a few poses, eventually I knelt down “WHOOOOOAAA watch out for the handles” Rob yelped. As the only person without glasses on the trip I was content I would not be squashing a priceless old wheelbarrow. “This is all well and good, but……Pub” came Joes voice as Rob set up for one more photo. We decided to make a hasty retreat, content the mine had been fully surveyed.
WHAT IN THE DAVID BLUNKETT IS HAPPENING HERE?!
We raced back to the water and soon enough the free dive was upon us. I had been looking forward to this all evening. Rob climbed up over a collapsed wooden stemple to get into the pool before it sumps. A big breath and he was gone. I climbed up and got snagged on my SRT kit, but eventually got free and into the pool. Staring at the point the water meets the ceiling. A big breath and I duck under and kick off. A few seconds later I emerge, exhilarating but shorter than I had hoped for. None the less good fun. Joe came through next and looked like he was drowning “Joe, you can put your feet down” I laughed. “im trying to keep the Disto dry” he replied treading water and one arm aloft with the box. Turning around I set off down Victory level at pace.
“WAIT Ben, I can’t see a thing” shouted Joe. I turned around to see Joe stumbling around, arms outstretched waving around and glasses completely fogged up. “What in the david Blunkett is happening here?!” I said as I looked past Joe to see Rob doing the same. A pair of blind zombies.
Like a diligent seeing eye dog I slowly led the invalids back to the sough where we cleaned out completely mud caked SRT kit and headed to cliffestyle.
DON’T WORRY, WE HAVE MISSED THE PUB SO JUST ENJOY YOURSELF
Joe shot off up the rope first and I made the mistake of standing at the base of the pitch. The rope was flinging around wildly whipping me in the face. I have done multiple up pitches before, but the most I have done in a oner is 35m, this was going to suck.
I clipped on and begun prussicking, 5 metres latter I finally left the ground, as I dangled freely I could not believe how much bounce this static rope had. I was moving up and down at least 1 metres with every move upwards. Steady away I thought as the pantin finally bit and started running through nicely. Without a pantin this would be miserable. I got into a nice rhythm and felt like I was moving well. In what felt like an eternity the hanging rebelay slowly began to glow in my torch light. Clipping the cowstails in I had a short breather before the switch over. Setting off again I suddenly noticed something wasn’t right; I had got myself all tangled. “f**k” clipping back into the cowstails I sat back into them to look at what I had done wrong. Hand jammer off, loop out the foot, switch it all around, check, check again. Right, we are good. Let’s go. Pitch number two began to bite. Not only did I have a wetsuit on, but I had a wetsuit hood and it’s safe to say I was cooking. I continued on, slightly slower this time. Legs felt fine but now my wrist injury was really starting to affect me. I lost all grip in my left hand and this meant my right was working overtime and kept giving me arm pump. Move 5m rest, 5m rest. FFS where is that rebelay.
I look down to see Rob patiently waiting already at the rebelay. “im so sorry for being slow Rob”
“Don’t worry, we have missed the pub so just enjoy yourself” came the reply. I explained this was my longest ever prussic and all I could hear was maniacal laughter from below. Move rest, move rest, F**k my arm kills.
Finally I see the last rebelay. I rush to switch over, only to make the same mistake as earlier. This is not the place to make mistakes and so I sorted myself out and continued on. Joe was on the surface now, looking down the shaft. Dam that light looks a long way away. Move rest, move rest. My core temp must be through the roof now. I genuinely thought I would never get out of that shaft, but finally I hauled my self over the lip and collapsed on the floor. Joe balled up in a foetal position due to the rain and cold.
What seemed like only minutes later “ALRIGHT GUYS” came an excited and smiling Rob. “We did it!”
A short hop back to the van where the heater invited us inside for beers, tea and cake.