Present: Anthony, Julia, Bec, Andrew
Would the curse of Ireby hit DUSA once again?! Yes! The cave smelt us coming and Anthony’s dad’s car had a puncture (his being in MoT), it took a bit of effort to get the wheel nuts off. We reached Bernies later than planned, here we met Pete ex DUSA caver of old.
It is some trudge up the hill over the moors to the higher cave entrance. The mist had descended and visibility was down to a matter of yards. However we found the chasm that holds the concrete tube cave entrance without much difficulty.
Bec was rigging the succession of pitches, Ding, Dong, Bell, Pussy and Well. It took a while, lack of height occasionally being a problem. But all safely down to the bottom we stomped a short distance towards the sump, gave up and stomped back.
This was my first cave on SRT, getting off the top of the bottom pitch was slightly annoying and prussiking up the second pitch in the waterfall is surely a good way of attempting the speed record (choke, gasp, gurgle, shiver, shiver, brrrr….)
June having the longest days of the year meant that we were still in the light when we exited the cave and met Martin Honey.
During the drive back the Ireby curse hit once again when we were stopped by the Police, a broken light being the culprit. Too late for the kebab shop, shame, closes at 11.00. £4.70 for (small) bacon butty and coffee at service station. The words rip and off come to mind, oh well.
Andrew Webber