The Loner, page 21
“Many fruitless hours were spent looking for it. Then, one day, some cavers happened to stop for a picnic. They sat down on some boulders and began to eat. It was a sheltered place. Then one of them noticed a draught...”
“You mean someone farted and wondered why he couldn’t smell it!” Bob interjected, with a hearty and irreverent laugh.
“To cut a long story short,” Pablo continued, ignoring Bob’s remark, “the boulder was eventually moved, and they found below it, a shaft a hundred and ten feet deep, which led into a huge cave system.”
“I thought you said there were two short pitches,” said Mark, with a worried frown.
“I’m not talking about County,” the apprentice retorted impatiently. “That was discovered much later. This was Lancaster Pot, which is at bottom end of t’system. County’s at t’other end.”
“Why’s it called Lancaster?”
“They called it Lancaster Pot, because it was just inside Lancashire County boundary, and is the only big cave in Lancashire,” Pablo continued.
“They followed cave downwards, and found t’Master Cave, which takes the Easegill Beck. The passage was about three miles long, and was on two levels. The lower level was a deep canyon about three or four foot wide, and more than eighty foot high in places. This is the Master Cave. The beck runs along it. The upper level was a series of enormous mud-floored caverns, as wide as fifty feet in many places, and with roofs upwards of thirty feet high. It followed a similar route to the stream passage. In many places it was directly above Master Cave, and the floors are either false, or there are holes and chasms which go down to stream eighty foot below. This old series was bone dry.”
“Why’s that?”
“I’d think it was gouged out of the rock, when the spring weather melted the glacial ice at end of Ice Age. Water table would have been higher then.
“Anyway, while this was going on, other cavers dug an entrance into upper end of system, some way downstream from where beck sinks. They called that Oxford Pot. It’s fallen in now, but it’s close to where County now is. It was a long time before the connection between the upper end and Lancaster was found. Strangely enough the connection was P.J.”
“What’s P.J.?” Mark interjected.
“Short for Poetic Justice,” Pablo replied. “You’ll see why it’s called that when you get there. It’s at t’Easegill end, you see.”
Mark felt uncomfortable and sensed that his visit to the system was not going to be so easy after all.
Bob picked up his guitar and idly strummed a chord. When he saw he had Pablo’s attention, he remarked: “You’ve missed best part of the story, Pablo. You haven’t told us how iron ladder got down there.”
Pablo grinned, and resumed the narrative. “Aye, now that is the best part of the story,” he said. “I doubt if many people know it. In fact I’m not sure of all the facts myself.
“You see, you have to remember that, when Lancaster was discovered, there weren’t many caving clubs, and then as now, they were each very jealous of the glory of finding something new.
“There are some fantastic formations down Lancaster, Mark, and the most famous are called the Colonnades.” He saw the blank look on Mark’s face, and anticipated the question which was forming on Mark’s lips.
“I don’t want to bore the rest of you,” he added, “but for Mark’s sake, I’ll explain that t’colonades are a group of eight or more columns in a grotto above Bridge Hall. Some are over nine feet tall. They really are magnificent, beautiful, gleaming, creamy white, glossy as marble, and almost translucent, growing out of a grey rock roof and sandy floor. They’re always worth looking at and photographing – you’ll find nowt like it in another British cave.
“Well, as exploration of Lancaster went ahead, t’club which had made most of the discoveries decided it would be easier if they put in an iron ladder on the entrance pitch. So they fitted one for all of hundred and ten feet and bolted it to wall of shaft. Then, either to protect the colonnades, or give themselves exclusive access to system, they built a manhole at top of shaft, secured it with concrete, and put a lock on it.
The trouble came when other clubs wanted to explore the system. They couldn’t see why only one club should have the exclusive right to explore one of Nature’s creations; so for a while, some clubs used jelly to break the lock...”
“Jelly?”
“Short for Gelignite! Some cavers had explosives licences – even then. So, that way they broke into the cave secretly, while the club which had built manhole wasted a lot of time and money on renewing the lock.
“Eventually they gave up, and entrance has been open ever since. Now, you’ll understand, it’s relatively easy to climb an iron ladder – even if it is a hundred and twenty feet deep; you have to know what you’re doing, if you want to make and climb a wire ladder – as only a real caving club can do. Well, as soon as lock was off for good, anybody and everybody could go down iron ladder and look at t’colonnades. And they did. Vandals too!
“One day, some cavers found some of t’colonnades had been smashed. It was a great shame. Nearly all of them had been broken, and lay in pieces on t’grotto floor. It was a bad day for caving, and something had to be done about it
“So enquiries were made of Araldite – that’s the company which makes the glue we use when we make caving ladders. Araldite were asked if they had a glue which would cement together the fragments of the Colonnades – which fortunately, the vandals had not taken away. Araldite sent some details; glue was purchased, and when you see Colonnades today, if you look carefully, you can see the joints where the glue was applied – although, of course, a thin layer of calcite is already slowly covering and concealing these marks.
At about the same time as Colonnades were repaired, they decided to make cave vandal-proof. It was clear that problem was that Colonnades were too close to the entrance and were too easy to get at from iron ladder. So, they either blasted the ladder from its bolts, or they took it down. That’s why there’s still a twenty foot section at bottom of pitch, making it a ninety instead of a hundred and ten. The rest of ladder was cut up into five or six sections, and erected in more remote parts of the system, to make exploration easier further down. So, once you’re down entrance pitch, there are iron ladders all the way to P.J., and they’re still there today.”
The following weekend, about ten Liverpool cavers drove up to Casterton Fell in another ancient and battered hired van. The road zigzagged up a steep escarpment, and it was a matter of skill and good fortune to coax the old vehicle up onto the moorland. There the road climbed gently until it reached the side of a valley, which it then followed. The hillside rose steeply on one side of the road, and on the other, plunged sheer down into the dale several hundred feet below. The weather was fine, and there was a superb panoramic view. Behind them they could see the distant hazy outline of the pastureland on the low ground side of the Craven Fault. There rose and rolled before them the bleak, rocky, windswept moorland, divided into parcels by neat dry stone walls, covered with grass and heather, saturated with peat bogs, and inhabited by a hardy population of sheep and grouse. Below, at the bottom of the valley, they could see the Leck Beck. Mark peered over the back of the driving seat, and observed it was wider than a stream or a brook: almost the size of a small river. He watched its water flow towards the low ground behind them. They had travelled some distance above the Beck when Dave, who was driving, pointed outside.
“There it is,” he said. “That’s where the water comes out.”
Mark and the others nearest the driver crowded to look over his shoulder and out of the window. The van veered suddenly as it turned a corner as if it was about to turn over. Someone cheered. Mark looked down, and saw water issue mysteriously from a gully below a cliff in the hillside into what appeared to be a tributary, while the main stream bed was dry and continued to rise steeply up the slope.
They parked the car at the end of the road outside an old farm house called Bull Pot Farm, which was used as a base for a caving club. There were about fifteen cars parked in the same area, several with cavers changing by them.
“Is everyone going to the same place?” Mark asked.
The others nodded.
“Does the farmer mind?”
“I don’t know. If he does, he doesn’t complain,” Bob said. “Perhaps he will one day, and if he does, that might not be a bad thing.”
This puzzled Mark. “You can’t mean that,” he said.
“Oh I do. There are so many people in the system, it gets congested. You’ll see. Any pressure that would force introduction of a booking system would be welcome.”
“Doesn’t the farmer mind people crossing his land?”
“He seems to be happy if we stick to main paths, and don’t disturb grouse in breeding season.”
This explanation surprised Mark, who had to study all about peoples’ rights. “Aren’t we trespassing?” he asked.
“Some farmers treat us like trespassers, Mark, and we don’t cross their land. Most don’t mind. You see, they don’t do badly from cavers. C.R.O. helps them rescue their animals.”
“Who are C.R.O., Bob?”
Bob laughed. “The Cave Rescue Organisation – potholers like ourselves,” he said.
Pablo corrected him. “That’s not right, Bob,” he remarked. “We could never belong to C.R.O. You have to be one of the best to get in there. They say no-one is accepted as a member of C.R.O. unless they can do the hardest caves in the foulest conditions. C.R.O. wouldn’t be much use otherwise. They’re the elite.”
“Are there many rescues?”
“Of course. They’re not always successful. Haven’t you heard of Neil Moss?” Pablo was becoming impatient. He wanted to swap jokes with Bob, and Mark’s unending series of questions was annoying him.
“No. Who’s he?”
Pablo was surprised. “You mean ‘who was he?’,” he said, emphasising the past tense. “You surprise me, Mark. Didn’t you ever read newspapers? A few years ago, it was a sensation for a month.”
“W-what happened?”
“Neil Moss was a caver exploring a fissure in Peak Cavern in Derbyshire. He went down a tight fissure, and got stuck. He was down so far that no-one could reach far enough to put a rope round his chest. So they couldn’t get him out. The air in fissure got foul. So they pumped oxygen down there. They kept him alive like this for some days. Then he died of exposure; but they still couldn’t get him out. So, in the end, they filled fissure with ready-mix. You can still see it to this day. It’s a gruesome tale; Neil’s still down there – permanently entombed in concrete.”
Mark made no comment, and became very quiet as they set off across the moor.
They came to a gate in a wall at the far end of a staked path, climbed it and followed the wall downhill to the dry stream bed of the Easegill Beck. They found an old metal trap door located by the stream bed. The trapdoor concealed a hole about ten feet deep, which from the stones and boulders lining it, had obviously been excavated by hand. There was a strong metal frame which held back the stones from collapsing and burying the entrance. Someone said this was County Pot.
They climbed into the hole one at a time, careful not to dislodge any loose stones. Mark’s turn came. He lowered himself down gingerly, and eased himself into the low passage at the bottom. It began as a narrow fissure with very little room. Then it twisted, and descended steeply, while, the roof rose above him.
Mark caught up with Bob, and was about to go past him. Bob called him back: “I wouldn’t bother if I were you,” he said. “There’s quite a queue round corner.”
Mark stopped and listened: sure enough he could hear the sound of voices and the clink of a ladder.
“Take a breather,” Bob continued. “There’s a party of about ten in front of us; then there are the ten of us, and the lads who are following us can’t be much less. So we’ll all just have to sit still and get cold. It’s like waiting for a bus in rush hour!”
It seemed a long wait, but in fact, it was less than a quarter of an hour before it was Mark’s turn to go down the ladder. He trembled, as the lifeline was tied round his waist, and then slowly and carefully eased himself onto the ladder. He looked down and was glad to see the bottom was not far. He reached the bottom with a pounding heart, but without losing his nerve.
Bob took snapshots while they waited for the others. Then he led the way down the cave. Mark followed him. Quite suddenly the narrow passage came to a dead end above a large opening. Mark lowered himself onto the floor of the opening. It was a sheer drop of about eight feet.
The character of the cave changed abruptly. Instead of a dry narrow tall passage, there was now room for six or more cavers to walk abreast. There was a stream with formations upstream. When they were all together, the cavers walked downstream. They soon took a turning to the right. A spray of water fell from the roof.
“That’s Shower Bath,” Bob observed.
Mark stepped past it quickly. “Not much of a shower,” he remarked.
“You should see it in flood conditions!” the other rejoined.
They had entered another narrow winding passage. A small stream ran along it and grew in depth, as it was joined by tributaries. This passage ended in the wall above another cavern. The stream ran over a smooth curving surface and then shot into space.
“That’s Spout Hall,” Bob announced, looking into the darkness. “This is where we all get wet!”
Bob dropped his knees into the water and looked downwards. He let his legs drop down into the apparent darkness behind him, grinned and cursed loudly, as he met the full force of the water. Then he was down and laughing. He called out slowly to Mark, “You’re next, Mark. Turn round; step down to your right as you face the stream. There’s a ledge there.”
Mark gingerly knelt down and felt for handholds. He eased his legs over the edge and searched desperately for the ledge. The cold stream water flowed onto his chest and waist. He realised vaguely that all the old clothes he was wearing were now soaked through. Then he moved sideways along the ledge, and a moment later, he was standing on the floor of a large cavern beside a small waterfall.
“How did you like that?” Bob asked.
Mark could not quite make up his mind whether he had enjoyed his soaking or not.
“There is another way which is completely dry and bypasses the Spout,” Bob added with a grin, “but this is much more fun!”
Pablo had joined them, and heard Bob’s comment. “Bob, my friend, you’re a bastard and a masochist!” he exclaimed.
Bob laughed. “You have to be a masochist to be a potholer!” he rejoined.
They followed the stream downwards into another narrow winding passage, through a few small chambers. They reached a place where the roof became so low that they had to crawl. They could see lights ahead of them and hear voices.
“This leads to Poetic Justice,” Bob told Mark, as he was about to enter the crawl.
“They should call it Congestion Corner!” remarked Pablo, who was not far behind.
The crawl ended in a small chamber, with the stream flowing through it and a roof made up of several large boulders, which looked as though they were ready to fall. About fifteen cavers, from an assortment of clubs, either sat or stood shivering, or shuffled about while Spout Hall water dripped off their clothes. Clearly the dry bypass was not very well known!
The centre of attention was a smooth rock-wall with a hole underneath it. That someone was behind the wall was clear from the grunts, the groans, the curses, and all the other signs of physical torment that issued from it. No part of the person responsible for these utterances was visible – except for his boots, which now appeared and then disappeared from view in the space at the bottom of the rock wall. Mark was at first, rather puzzled, and could not understand what was going on. After a while, he realised that the individual behind the rock was, in fact, trying to go upwards, if only he could find a successful way of overcoming the force of Gravity which seemed to be determined to pull him in the opposite direction.
So this was Poetic Justice.
“Have you brought rope?” Pablo enquired accusingly.
“Rope? What do you want a rope for?” Bob asked.
“For the novices.”
“Oh, they’ll be all right. They can do without!”
It seemed a long time before it was Mark’s turn. He crawled into the hole at the bottom of the wall and stood up. It was a narrow fissure. A climber might have called it a chimney. Moisture, saturated with lime, oozed over the wall surfaces, coating them with sublimated calcite, and making them extremely slippery. Some tiny ledges near the bottom served as slight footholds, while several feet above this, a stone, wedged between the walls of the chimney, where they converged, provided the only other assistance for the frustrated potholer.
Mark obtained a precarious purchase for one foot on one of the narrow ledges. He braced his back and his knees and forced himself upwards. He tried to rise above the stone. He slipped downwards. His boiler suit tore, and the jeans behind the tear were wearing thin. He tried again, and gain, and a fourth time. Soon the knees of his jeans were developing a large hole, and his knees felt bruised.
“I can’t do it,” he called in despair.
“Course you can,” Bob called from above. “All you have to do is a bit of a press up!”
Mark reflected he never had been able to do press-ups at school.
Then he heard Pablo’s angry voice bellowing at him from below, “What do you think you’re doing, Mark? Hurry up, you bastard!”
At last, after a supreme effort of will and the expenditure of a considerable amount of energy, Mark got his elbow above the stone. He pressed on it, and to his surprise, rose to the top. Now he could do press-ups after all, he thought. He was sweating profusely. He realised that the few articles of clothing which had survived the soaking from the Spout were now drenched with sweat.
