Details

Written by: Rob Eavis

Published: 22 April 2016

Hits: 5525

Rob Eavis, Luke Cafferty

After hearing nasty stories of the “cave for real men”, we decided to go check out Mountbatten Pot and see if we were up to the challenge. A further excuse was to get it on the 3D survex file, as the close locality of the bottom to Nettle’s Far Flats bedding plane makes it an exciting prospect.

With little information to go off we went armed with 60m of rope and plenty of rigging gear including drill and stainless bolts. Luke led the descent, making quick work of rigging off the insitu 8mm through-bolts (take 4 hangers to reach the bottom), and by some good wiggling and meandering of his way down through the tightest sections, it was quickly a “rope free” and I went to join him.

It’s actually a surprisingly friendly little pot, with even a few quite spacious sections. The tightest bit is roughly ½ way down, and is certainly quite a committing move. If something jammed or snagged you could easily end up in difficulty. Luckily I simply slide through and before long we were both snuggly at the bottom inspecting the digging operations that had happened in the past. It’s not an easy place to work, as the dig face (floor) is quite cramped. No open gaps in the rocks means no chance for a draught, so not too much to encourage you.

We started surveying out. I was grateful for having my Pantin foot jammer as it made ascending the tightest bits almost easy, although Luke managed extremely well without one.

Back on the surface after just over an hour, it felt almost like we’d been cheated. An easy and enjoyable trip for a change, leaving plenty of pub time to discuss the next “proper” trip…

----------------------

The survey concludes the current depth is 44m. This puts it 11m above the Far Flats, although with the bedding dipping to the East it could be more like 7-8m. Certainly a big undertaking, but with very high prospects...

Details

Written by: Jon Pemberton

Published: 25 February 2016

Hits: 3764

Andy Chapman, Red Rose CC. & I

My day began at 06:15 with a pleasant wake up from the alarm. The drive up to Ingleton from Sheffield was rather pleasant and I was even early meeting the others at Inglesport at 09:30. Once I had gulped down an extortionately priced large mug of tea we headed over to Cold Cotes and parked at the bottom of the vague footpath up Ingleborough. The Weather had taken a turn for the worse as was expected (the reason for choosing this pot in the first place). It’s listed in the NFTFH guide book as, “it’s also relatively dry and might be of interest when other systems are too wet to enter”. The walk up say approx. 25mins but this doesn’t take into consideration clag and general roaming on the lower fells of Ingleborough. Once said hole was located we were all ready to get underground, the survival shelter even made an appearance so that people on the surface were protected from the elements – a large party of eight we were

The entrance is a small 6m fluted pitch which can be free climbed, maybe the use of a short bit of tat to get oneself through the entrance boulders would be a good shout. At the bottom a small hole leads to a rift and a parallel rift which eventually climbs down to “The Ripper” squeeze. A chocked stone enables you to squeeze through at roof level, Chapman and another RR struggled with this squeeze but made it through eventually with sheer determination, that and not wanting to head above ground I expect! Through here leads to That’s Better pitch (15m) followed by a climb down to FTSE choke opening up to FTSE choke pitch (5m) An awkward squeeze (The Gripper) through boulders and a short drop down leads to a scaff bar rebelay, prob best rigged from here and a tight back up line to clip into from above… Although this pitch again could possibly be free-climbed by a confident person, it didn’t look that bad…

At the bottom water could be heard thundering away. I overheard a, “bugger it, I’m going for it!” Then a thundering of water on someone’s PVC caving suit. By this point I was already feeling cold and defiantly not full gas! Champan shouted to me to follow the water down a tight meandering passage where Sandy instructed me where to put my feet, this is where Chapman turned around (one too many pies over Winter perhaps?) Once through and out of the water we were at the top of Roll pitch (12m). This lands you in a rift and to a short blasted crawl (The Rizla) followed by a thrutchy 2m climb down to a further climb or traverse over Millennium Pot (4m). At the bottom you follow the rift (whilst not dropping the final tackle sack!) to the final squeeze (The Ripper) which I struggled with the most out of the three. You drop down a tight rift to where a passage heads off  roughly 2m from the floor and forces your legs the wrong way. Through here a short climb down Hammerhead Pot leads to another blasted crawl which ends abruptly at Electron Pitch (16m) followed by Megatron Pitch (38m). Here is where we turned around as the water at the rebelay was hammering down right above the changeover point which could easily become tasty with a sudden rise in water.

The trip out was uneventful, mainly mugging off Champman for not getting through the easier Gripper squeeze and general nonsense of how cold it was going to be on surface, which it was! All in all a short trip which needs a return trip to bottom. Any takers?

Details

Written by: Jon Pemberton

Published: 01 February 2016

Hits: 3426

Bob Toogood and I

Quick Jaunt down Giants to test Bob's shoulder having not caved since November and the 15hr trip to the far reaches of Torca La Vaca! Met at Wardlow for some chow and headed over to Giants when it started to snow - Nice!

Fairly straight forward trip with no incident bar Bob up to his usual tricks of getting absolutely soaked beyond the need (dropped his gloves in the stream before even entering the cave!) SRT on Garlands  and Bob even took me to somewhere I'd never been before and we stuck high in the crabwalk rather than dropping down which I can highly recommend to anyone to avoid the same ol' trip again. Climbed around out of Garlands rather than back up the rope which was quite fun but not quicker.

Surfaced at midday so a couple of hour trip. Stopped for a brew in Hope after to warm up.