SUMMER
During the next weeks, much hard work was done in the Borehole, without
important result. The Innominate Sink was tackled again, with no better
luck. Blind Pot received attention which was not rewarded. There was digging
in the ochre-filled depths of the Top Sinks. Here we all spent a happy hour
diverting the stream, in the hope of washing out the clayey fill. We were
feeling very discouraged, when heavy work at the Slit Sinks eventually
removed enough rock for Ashworth to force himself in. He followed a
Snake-like passage to the head of a 15ft pitch on July 9th. Next weekend
after more hammering, two parties of "ferrets" slipped in (we hold back our
skinnier specimens for occasions like these!). When they came out, their
stories were so conflicting that there was much hilarity before we realised
that the parties had been down two quite distinct systems, each leading
through constricted ways down to 50ft pitches (Dunnington, Ashworth, Eyre
and Hodgson). This was no easy entrance. We went away disappointed after all
our hard work.
Sunday July 22nd
In Bliss's words (published in 'The British Caver')... "We decided to
tackle the nearest pitch first, which meant leaving the passages by our
favourite method, climbing up into the roof, over the top, and down into a
quite separate passage. That end of the pitch was quite narrow. We lowered
the ladders and found it took 50ft to reach the bottom. Hodgson was very
anxious to go down. As he had found the pitch the previous week, we named it
Hodgson's Hole. At the bottom he shouted up, "Another pitch below!".
As Eyre started to descend, a loud boom came to our ears followed by a low
murmur growing louder and louder until it was like the sound of an express
train. We shouted for Hodgson to come up, got the bright answer "What
for?" ...when he heard the roar, I think he beat all records up the
ladder. He had just stepped off when a wall of water carrying rocks with it
swept down the passage and over the pitch. We crossed over hastily and had a
look at the passage by which we were to return; surprisingly, it was dry. We
had surmised that the flooded passage was from the Borehole, which is about a
hundred yards higher up Ease Gill. Our only worry now was how long it would
be before the water would pour down Slit Sinks, which has at its entrance an
extremely tight squeeze quite impossible when flooded. We all made a dive for
the exit sign. At last the entrance squeeze was reached. I think the corners
must have been greased at the speed we slipped through. I was just grunting
at the tightest place when a trickle of water ran under my arm and down my
shirt. A crack in the roof suddenly opened up and let a cascade pour down my
back. Suddenly I got through and could see the others, backs towards me,
eating sandwiches in the gill. Leyland wasn't far behind me, with nothing
worse than a good soaking. The sun was blazing down, and not a cloud in the
sky. We found out later that it had not rained at all since we went down
earlier. Delayed drainage from the night's storms must have flooded the
gill."
The following night with Gemmell and Myers we found the next pitch to
be 15ft only. From the huge chamber at the bottom, all there was leading off
was a 3ft passage half filled with water: 'The Water-Python'. Gemmell
and Myers were on holiday for the rest of the week, their magnum opus as far
as Ease Gill was concerned being a surface survey of the topographical
features between Cow Dub below Oxford Pot, and the Top Sinks, using tape and
Abney level.
Next weekend (July 29th) we crossed over to Ease Gill. It was a peerless
day of full summer, hot-looking and cloudless over towards the coast, with
lofty cumulus towers above the Lakeland hills and nearer peaks. Dunnington
and Beaumont went down the Slit Sinks to survey the system. Bradshaw and I
hammered away at the rocks, trying to secure a flood-proof entrance. When at
last we had our way, we stripped off and washed in the dub above the
Borehole. While waiting for the others, we picked bell heather from the fine
clumps which overhung the gill. In spite of the surveyor's report, and
Bliss's previous account of Wretched Rabbit Passage, which gave us ample
reason to hope that there might be some simple connection, we had to admit
that our work on the Slit Sinks had largely been wasted in view of the
extremely restricted nature of the terminal passages in this system. These
things are relative: in some caving areas, the discovery of 600ft of passage
and two 50ft pitches might have been an event of major importance.
An ugly note was struck during the summer. Some person or persons unknown
twice came across to Oxford Pot and rolled down great boulders over the
entrance, presumably in the hope of stopping our access to the Promised
Land. How folk can justify such actions, I do not know. On September 9th we
spent a long time trying to restore the status quo. At the end of the
afternoon, Riley, Shorrocks, Hodgson and Bradshaw went down the Rosy Sink.
Eventually Bradshaw said he would come back during the week to deal with the
boulder blocking this rather promising passage. On Thursday, with Bliss, he
removed the obstruction. Miraculously, after all these months, they made
their way down an easy passage, with only a 15ft pitch, into Broadway. At
long last The Snake had been bypassed. The Promised Land could now be
entered without the fear of the consequences of some trivial accident to a
tired potholer, the original sufferers from Snakeitis now realising that a
large part of their disease had been due to the fear of finding themselves
with a broken limb at the wrong end of this abominably tortuous passage.
These fears were now removed.
The Caverns of Upper Easegill:
Next page: Autumn ... and Winter again
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Appendices:
I : Record of Hydrological Tests
II : Notes on the Survey
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