Bullpot (Kingsdale) 23/11/19

I was lucky enough to sneak another caving trip in on Saturday as Dave and Jacob were driving down to Bullpot (Kingsdale) for rigging training and let me tag along with them. We stopped off at the fish n chip shop in Ingleton because for once it was open. The day didn’t start off as smoothly as usual due to me forgetting to bring clothes to wear under my oversuit, and collecting two right-footed wellies from the gear store. Luckily Dave had a few spare clothes in his car, though this left me with a pair of oversized shorts and two t-shirts. Perhaps the lack of leg protection is why the bruises on my knees are worse than usual despite doing barely any crawling. We soaked the ropes in Yordas and whilst crawling out Dave noted that it was ‘interesting’ that one of the caves had sumped. This did make me feel slightly nervous as the idea of drowning is the main thing I feel uncomfortable about in caves (which is ironic as I love water). I needn’t have worried however, as Bullpot was very dry and I felt at home as soon as I was underground.

The entrance was absolutely beautiful – an unprotected gap in some rocks with green ferns lining the vertical walls of the pitch. Sheep bones scattered the bottom from when unfortunate animals had wandered over the edge. The second pitch was extremely close to the entrance. I spent a lot of time waiting around whilst Jacob did the rigging but didn’t mind at all, partly because I was expecting that anyway, but also because I just liked being surrounded by rock and the act of being in a cave made it enjoyable even when I was standing still. A small ledge divided the second from the third pitch; which involved a hanging rebelay. I felt reasonably confident with what I was doing but checked with Dave to be sure. The rebelay itself was very easy and I’d barely define it as hanging due to the close rock which enables one to sufficiently wedge themselves between the two walls so that they are basically sitting down. There is also a comfortable ledge just below if needed.  The fourth pitch is close by, and though this usually involves at least one deviation (two in wetter conditions), neither were necessary as there was very little water.

[Source: https://cncc.org.uk/cave/bull-pot]

We decided not to do the final pitch due to time + rigging difficulty, and it was when I started ascending back up the fourth pitch that I noticed a problem with my chest jammer. It frequently failed to ‘jam’, as such, so I had to stand up in the foot loop and jam it in manually using my right hand. Though this was more strenuous and less than ideal the hand jammer was perfectly fine and I knew that I was safe, so kept going until I reached the top. Here I swapped my chest jammer with Dave’s, as the last time I’d attempted a hanging rebelay I’d gotten stuck (at the entrance pitch to Bullpot of the Witches) so we wanted to make it as easy as possible. However this time, the rebelay was perfectly fine (again, probably helped by the fact being wedged between two walls was a comfortable position which made it easier to transfer my weight) and Dave’s chest jammer made prusiking significantly easier. I also know how to use my feet to tighten the rope now – interestingly, having two right-footed boots helped. At the top I transferred my jammers onto the second pitch, and was about to ascend when I heard some heavy breathing down below. I was aware that Dave is not a fan of heights so thought it best to wait on the ledge in case there was anything I could do to help. I shouted down a few words of encouragement but didn’t want to intervene too much and there were no major problems. I had actually thought about his fear of heights when we’d transferred chest jammers and perhaps it was wrong of me to ignore that. I asked if Dave wanted to change jammers again and offered to carry one of the bags but he said he was okay with them. Thus I ascended the second pitch, and then the entrance pitch, and we emerged into the night.

Overall Bullpot was very enjoyable, taking us around 5 hours. It felt different to any other caving trip I’d previously done due to the almost wholly vertical nature of it, but I found this well-suited to my taste as SRT is by far my favourite part of caving. As well as being fun, it also strengthened my SRT skills and built up a lot of confidence so that I now feel wholly comfortable descending and ascending, and navigating rebelays by myself. I also much preferred being in a smaller group of people as it allowed the benefits of group caving, without removing all of the sense of peace and connection one gets when caving alone. I do tend to prefer longer trips which involve travelling / exploration and being underground for longer periods of time, but for a day trip this was perfect.