Saturday 3 June. Five of us squeezed into our car at the ridiculously early time of 8.00 am and set off for Weardale and Fairy Holes Cave. After an uneventful but beautiful journey across the Dales, we arrived at the authorised parking place for the cave. Out of the car we piled and, after scattering our belongings across the road, we started to change into caving gear. We were still in various states of undress, when a man, presumably a quarry official, arrived and politely queried our presence. We showed him our permit and the cave key but he apparently had no record of our planned visit. Moreover, a shooting event was being set up in the quarry. Not being keen on being either shot (unlikely) or locked in the quarry (highly likely), we cut our losses and headed over to Nenthead to explore the old lead mines.
Sweltering in the hot sun, we first wandered up to Smallcleugh Mine where Mike and i thought we would be able to take the team to the Ballroom. No such luck but we did spend a happy couple of hours wandering around the maze of tunnels, turning back and trying other options at places where the roof or walls looked particularly unstable. Stuart's little white arrows, taken along for the Fairy Holes Cave trip as recommended on the permit, came in very useful. When we were finally tired of not finding the Ballroom, we were able to return quickly to the entrance and yet more sunshine.
Back down to the carpark and into the cool entrance of the Brewery Shaft. After admiring the size of the shaft itself we headed further in through a series of amazingly well-decorated passages and into Rampgill. So much to see, so far to walk. But time was running out on our callout with Paul Geddes so we turned around (reluctantly on my part) and headed out.
Team: Jane, Mike, Stuart, Martin, and Martin's real imaginary friend Rich
Time underground: about 4 hours
Time on the road : 4 hours
