Event review

Caving

It came to be that a band of York IVCers, joined by some of our friends from Tees Valley IVC, were brave (insane?) enough to volunteer to go caving in the Yorkshire Dales. We were led into the middle of nowhere by our Guide, at which point we became slightly concerned and decided to run away if he started playing a banjo. Anyway, all was well and we changed into our caving suits and welly boots and marched off to find a hole in the ground. Tension mounted and silence fell as we approached our fate.

In hindsight, we made a slight error when asked by our plucky guide Dave whether we wanted it "hard or easy" in going for the former. Only then did he tell us that he does a lot of work training the army! We found out quite quickly that this wasn't going to be an easy afternoon of playing in the water. Question of the afternoon: "You don't want a rope, do you?". So, we had a fine time slipping around underground, climbing up and down near vertical gulleys, falling in over our heads in cold-water lagoons, squeezing through unfeasibly small spaces and bumping our heads a lot. This may not sound like fun, but actually it was a fantastic experience and we shared a real sense of achievement in getting out alive!
After several hours, we emerged into the fantastic Dales countryside bruised, soaking and cold, but feeling great and with a new appreciation of daylight.

The day was rounded off with a pub meal in Settle, though we were all still rather damp! Thanks to Andy and Shaun for organising a great day out.