Gaping Gill Winch

We've had an awesome day!

It's been a long time in the planning and the weather forecast this week has been changing by the minute.  At the latest possible moment, we plumped for staying over on Tuesday night and having an early start to experience the wonders of Gaping Gill.

It didn't seem that there were many people in front of us with just a few cars in Clapham.  We enjoyed an amble up with only one person walking past us but, by the time we arrived at two minutes past the 8am opening time, we were numbers 66 and 67!  With just 20 people an hour being able to be winched up and down, that was a bit longer wait than we'd expected.  We pondered over heading up Ingleborough but instead, passed the time chatting with each other, some of the potholers and other tourists.  There was no breeze and thankfully, no showers, so we were in luck there.  We had a bit of a walk uphill to ensure we kept warm enough and looked back to better views than we had on Pen-y-ghent over two years ago (I'd never've guess it was that long ago!)

The winch down is brilliant with a remarkably close-to-the-wall descent passing dripping moss and waterfall spray and splashes.  Most of the river has been diverted and the whole task of setting up the system is really impressive with the potholing club up there for three weeks setting it up, running a week's meet for their own club and then opening to the public for the week.

We had a short scramble up to a tunnel and along a while until we were nearly bent in two.  We were lucky enough to have that to ourselves and took the opportunity of a lights out moment (and of course, dad pretending he'd done a runner when I chatted to him... Predictably funny!)

The whole team of volunteers were great characters, particularly the guy in the cavern who ensured we didn't slip coming back down and shared some interesting snippets of information about the cave system and the erosion of the ice age mud floor over the time he's been visiting.

We stood in awe for a while and explored a few nooks and crannies with our torches before heading back up the 100m sloping line to the surface.   Still no rain, we meandered back down, stopping at the cheese cafe for lunch (and cheese!) before making our way back home... in the rain.

Perfect timing.  Perfect outing. x