We met Stuart France in the DYO car park and headed past the dinosaurs, through the show cave
and into the frigorific lakes. The water was rarely so deep that swimming was necessary, but
swimming is just so much better than mincing around the edge, trying to fondle the rope from
start to finish; so our aches and pains from the previous night’s games were
soon frozen out of us. After climbing up past a lovely stal column and watching Stuart perform
some kind of alchemy in Pot Sump, we bounded into Boulder Chamber. All easy going with some
wonderful formations led us to the Horse Trough, where we wriggled through some shallow water,
then into the Long Crawl (You call that a long crawl?) and dropped down an in situ ladder into
Gerrard Platten Hall. Massive, massive passage followed and we all had a little flabbergasm in an
exciting oxbow.
More gigantic passage brought us through Cloud Chamber and into Green Canal, where again we
swam in the cold water. A Goonies style slide down down into the Abyss and we were soon at the
Camel’s Back. Actually I’m pretty sure the back would have been going over that obstacle; we
crawled through a small, damp passage lower down, so not sure exactly which body part of the
camel we were in. A little bit more aqueous caving and we were in Bakerloo Street. Unfortunately
we failed to find Hammersmith and City Street, so we were unable to change from the brown line
to the pink. Some prefer it that way though. Filthy innuendos were cast aside as we entered the
Washing Machine. Stuart and I jumped straight in to the turbulent lather and swam under the rock
bridge to glory, whilst Pete, Alex and Dunc boldly raged against the Washing Machine and simply
admired from afar.
There were a few more lakes for us to wade through on our way back to Gerrard Platten Hall, from
where we pounced up the ladder, through the Long Crawl and into Shower Aven. What had
previously been a trickle of water down one wall was now a veritable tsunamic torrent.
Auspiciously, Stuart had had the foresight to warn us of this natural phenomenon, which occurs on
a regular basis and is not a sign that the cave is experiencing flash flooding, so we retained control
in the trouser department and did not create another Bakerloo Street. My failure to charge my
light overnight, coupled with the fact that I had been used as the light source in almost all the
photographs taken over the weekend (surely I would be better employed as a model, with these
looks) meant that Nora was getting a bit dim, so I had to back her up with my Fenix for the last
section of this tremendous, glorious, amazing cave.
