TRIP TO THE DOUBS, FRANCE - 13th to 27th JUNE 2020
Alex Crowe recently sent an email to the UBSS email list which some of
you might have seen if the list was behaving itself, but there's also a
chance that it just got eaten by the spam monster or otherwise lost or
mislaid, so here we go again, and over to Alex...
Good evening all,
As some of you already know, Jess and I are planning another trip to
France this summer. We're heading to the Doubs region of France for 2
weeks in June.
The area is notable for spectacular stream caves and particularly long through trips.
We are inviting people from several caving clubs. There should be a wide
range of trips available but you will need to be able to do SRT
completely independently.
We have booked the 'Gite Speleo' for the 13th to 27th June 2020.
If you are interested in coming or would like more information please
let us know so we can keep you informed of goings on. If you are
definitely coming then a deposit of £50 is payable to me to secure your
booking. This is to minimise flakeyness and last minute drop-outs and to
enable us to actually plan things with some confidence (we know what
you lot are like!).
It is possible to come for 1 week or 2 although a degree of coordination
will be required to keep things sensible on the middle weekend. There
are 12 bunks available in the section of the hut we currently have
booked.
Yay caving!
Alex
For more info, or to book a place, contact Alex.
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EXPEDITION SPONSORSHIP - HOW TO GET IT RIGHT
Captions from Dick, left to right: Sac on shoulder (1988, in Irian
Jaya). Dick, heavily weighed down (990, in Uzbekistan) Colin and Tim
(1991, in Mulu).
Hard on the heels of talk of trips
abroad, I caught the lovely Dick Willis, one of our most experienced
expedition cavers, in a weak moment and he didn't hit me with The Brick
when I asked him to write something for the newsletter. What he came up
with will be damn useful for anyone planning something that can
reasonably be styled an expedition, and while trips to
Mendip/Yorkshire/Wales etc may sometimes feel like one, you' probably
need a degree in creative writing to pull off sponsorship for that, but
anything else could be fair game, even surveying and book writing trips
to Co Clare. so over to Dick....
Always treat your sponsors well.
As a result of having had my potential career destroyed after falling in
with a bad lot at Bristol (Messrs Mullan, Boycott, Smart et al), I
always had a shortage of cash to buy gear and I had to fall back on
scrounging or upgrading cheap stuff. I still remember my first sleeping
bag, purchased on a discount from Ellis Brighams at the top of
Whiteladies Road – still there after all these years and will give you
an automatic 10% discount if you mention Wilderness Lectures. I couldn’t
afford a decent down one so I bought one that economised…
It was constructed in the usual caterpillar like segments but on one
side, they were stuffed with artificial fibre and on the other side with
down; at least, the manufacturer said it was down. This was great in
theory – you slept on the artificial stuff, which didn’t compress and
lose its insulation, whilst the down lofted nicely on your upper side.
The reality was very different. Fidgeting while asleep meant that the
down ended up underneath and, anyway, neither filling was good enough to
keep me warm. A little UBSS ingenuity was deployed when someone in the
flat threw out an old down bedspread. I cut open each compartment on the
sleeping bag, stuffed it with down from the scrap bedcover and resealed
the cuts with duct tape. Never, ever be without duct tape.
This worked for a while but in later years I got rather good at scrounging gear for expeditions. When we went to Mulu in 1980,
I got a deal from a company that marketed outdoor gear. In response to
my pleading letter, the boss said he’d support us and invited me and
Jerry Wooldridge to a trade show at which they were exhibiting. He
walked us round and invited us to choose whatever we wanted and just let
him know quantities and sizes. This was like letting us loose in an
Aladdin’s cave and we produced a long list of stuff, expecting to have
most of it politely declined but it was all approved. Even better, when
Andy Eavis went to their warehouse in his company truck to collect
the gear, the MD told him to walk around and make sure that he got
everything he needed…When we got back, I phoned the MD to thank him but
the firm had gone out of business. He must have known it was coming and
preferred to give away gear in a good cause than see it go to the
administrators.
The same expedition got a deal from Karrimor. Each of us was given two
rucksacks, a large capacity sac and a day sac, each embroidered with a
name and ‘Mulu 80’. At the time, Karrimor was offering a lifetime
guarantee and, bless them, my big sac has been back to them twice for
repair. I still have both sacs and they’ve been on over 20 major trips
with me. One of the above photos is of me walking out after the
Samarkand ’90 expedition, illustrating why my knees are knackered (made
worse by caving for years in Clare without knee pads). The second photo,
taken on a trip to Irian Jaya in 1988, demonstrates that manufacturers
can spend a fortune on ergonomic design only to have their efforts
completely ignored. That porter would have had no trouble working as a
dustman in the days when you had to lift the full bin onto your shoulder
to get to the lorry!
In 2012, I took a photo of that big sac at Mulu Park HQ and sent it to
Karrimor just to say thanks. I didn’t expect anything other than an
acknowledgement in return but they invited me to choose any Karrimor
rucksac I wanted, so I did.
Through a friend, I was lucky enough to get supported by Alexandra
Workwear. They provided umpteen Mulu expeditions with polycotton
boilersuits in bright photogenic colours, shirts, shorts etc. On one
occasion, their sales director asked me if there was anything else we
needed and I asked her what else they did. “We’re a workwear company”,
she replied.... We could have gone on that trip wearing business suits
if we had wanted or, indeed, nurses uniforms.
Of course, what sponsors want is good photographic coverage and
excellent reviews of their equipment. And it’s important that you make
sure you take photos of sponsors’ gear early in the expedition.
Strangely, the photo of Colin Boothroyd and Tim Fogg, taken after a four
day trip in Clearwater in 1989, was never used by Alexandra Workwear or
the people who provided us with free chocolate bars.
And it’s essential to let the sponsor know how well their gear
performed. If you say good things, they can quote you. On the other
hand, if you have to be critical, well, unless they get honest
appraisals, they can’t improve their products. Our expedition to Yunnan in 1991
was supplied with Merrell boots by the importer. They were fabulously
comfortable, the most comfortable boots that any of us had ever owned.
Unfortunately, they had no grip whatsoever on wet surfaces and caving in
them was like caving in roller-skates; it was a miracle no one got
hurt. The importer was very happy to hear that they were so comfy but
much less happy to hear that they were lethal.
So, sponsorship…
- Ask politely, you’ve got nothing to lose but a bit of time and a stamp.
- Take the trouble to find out the name of the MD and write personally to her/him.
- Do a bit of research and be clear about what you want.
- Make sure you take good photos while the gear is clean, as well as ones of it in use.
- Write honest reviews of the gear.
- SAY THANK YOU
- And always carry duct tape.
Dick Willis
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CAVEFEST 2020 - MENDIP
Cavng doesn't just happen in the
confines of the club, wonderful though we are, so here's an advance date
for your diary from the folks who run Cavefest. There'll be lots of
trips on offer and it's a good way to get to know more caves and more
cavers. More details will follow as plans for this firm up. There will
also be posts on Facebook. Over to Neil Jackson, one of the organisers,
for a few words...
CavefestUK
are returning to The Mendip Hills next year for their 2020 event. We
have booked the same field as the RESCON event at Ebborways farm.
The event dates are; 28th- 31st August 2020
There will be an onsite bar, food vendors, live music, competitions and
displays. Arts and crafts, workshops, demonstrations and much much more.
Our invitation for the UBSS to be involved includes the offer to present
something at the festival itself. Any talented artists, film makers,
performers etc . are welcome to come along and make it just that little
more special.
Neil Jackson
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CHRISTMAS DINNER AT THE PUB
I didn't take a roll call, but, from left
around the table, here we have Graham (partial head, no rude comments,
please!), Nathan, Alec, Kym, Haydon (still busy sending emails to the
list), Sam, Merryn, Rosie, Ash, Jan. No Whatley as he was off partying
with Rouffy. Dunno where Sioned was hiding when I took this. She must
have been talking to the nice bar staff.
Being suckers for punishment, an organising committee loosely
consisting of Haydon and Sioned (neither of whom ran far enough and fast
enough when this came up in a committee meeting) took on the task of
sorting out a Xmas dinner for all.
In true UBSS fashion, epic faff followed as
it transpired that OneDrive docs are shite, so a vast number of
increasingly frantic emails went out on the list and Facebook messages
got bandied about, winning Haydon a prize for the most emails ever sent
for one event. Congratulations! However, in a very un-faffy way, Sioned
managed to sort out the Eldon in Clifton and the food with relative ease.
I suck at counting, but I think about 12 of us turned up for dinner at
6.30. There were some hats, a lot of food (all ordered from the bar and
very good) and some prizes, apart from the fact that I'd left the prize
bag in the car and couldn't be arsed to walk back up the hill, so the
actual handing out of prizes will wait until Haydon organises the
handover. As I was inside several large gins by then, I've totally
forgotten who got what, apart from me getting the Snark Prize, which I
am immensely proud of, as it gives me officlal permission to dish out
Snark, whenever and wherever it's needed. I will use my Super Power
wisely, and frequently, (yes, Adrian Wilkins, I'm looking at you!!).
I had a great evening mainly chatting to Nathan and a the guy on his
left with the Hat (sorry, I am crap at remembering names!!) about genre
TV shows Nathan's worked on (Jan Walker and I have something in common
with him, which was brilliant. He worked on Season 3 of Primeval and we
are huge fans of the show and know some of the same people, so it was
the smallest of small world moments!).
We all left before a band started up in the corner. No surprises there.
They might have been good, but more drinking beckoned for some and an
early(ish) night for others.
Many thanks to the organisers and everyone who came along!
And as a Secret Santa didn't get organised due to faff, Mia is running
one now. If you're on Facebook or otherwise got involved, Do as You're
Told, Mia is in charge.
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NEW YEAR'S EVE DINNER AT THE HUT
It didn't snow at New Year, This is just
for artistic effect and because Liz Green kindly sent me this piccie and
I really like it.
The New Year's Eve dinner is the
longest unbroken tradition in the society going right back to the
beginning in 1919 when the Hut was erected in a snowstorm, which is why
the tilt of the roof is still crooked, or so the story goes. It's
probably true, as about 100 years is our par time for building works...
Due to the Lurgy from Hell that's been doing the rounds, we were reduced
in number but not in enthusiasm. A turkey dinner and all the trimmings
was cooked (some of it in Bristol, some at the hut) and we scoffed it
like food was going out of fashion. Naturally, in best poncey restaurant
review style, I photographed the food for posterity and took a few
other snaps.
Dinner, I like sprouts. Don't judge me.
We were all knackered and mostly ill and didn't stay beyond midnight, but here is a quick run down of the evening:
It started with arrival, booze and Take the Piss out of Adrian for not
reading his newsletters properly and not knowing that the dinner was
happening and that Elaine had Replaced Bob as President at the AGM. We
impressed on him that even skim reading might impart useful information.
Cue much snarking from your ever-harassed editor.
The was the usual moan from Her Up at The Farm about gates being open,
but it's hard to go in and out through a closed gate, so after Chris and
Galya exchanged the customary pleasantries with her, it was business as
usual.
We decided not to use 5 gallons of water to fill the tank just for a
bowl of washing up, so just ran the fire and the radiator under the
bunks. I was toasty warm, other people were nesh wimps (Helen, I'm
looking at you!) and complained about the cold. I said they were all
sounding like Dickon and should person-up or wear more clothes. I was
deemed to be Unsympathetic.
Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.
I learned that putting your feet on the radiator under the seat is Very Nice. Other people then followed suit.
I also learned that trying to put too much wood on the fire is A Thing. I
tried to impress on people that flames do not equal heat output. Most
people didn't listen. I sighed heavily and snarked. The fire is great,
but it doesn't need a fuck-ton of wood. Haydon has done a long
explanation of the system which will be available via a weblink to users
in future, but for now I think we can sum it up as don't use too much
wood and make sure boiling water isn't spurting out of the shower as
that is A Bad Thing.
Barney the Dog brought Adrian along for the evening. Those of you who
met him a few years ago when Adrian hadn't had him long would be amazed
by his transformation. He's gone from being a terrified creature who
humans had rarely been kind to a happy, confident dog who mixes well and
is lovely to have around (OK, who expects me to he rude about Adrian
now? Hands up..... Nope, not going to rise to that challenge as it would
be way too predictable!). It shows what can be done with love and
patience. The pair of them adore each other and as a dog lover it gives
me the warm fuzzies to see a dog taken from the what amounted to Death
Row to a happy, obedient much loved companion. (This is now the point at
which Dick Willis would have swooped in and sent me recipes for dog
from his China days, but now he's totally owned by an adorable lurcher
called Brillo, I know that won't happen. No, Dick, that's not a
challenge and there will be no prizes for dog recipes.)
We performed the rituals with enthusiasm, and the sneezing was all too
real. We remembered as many people as we could. Maybe next year we need A
List. I will try to write the rituals up for a later newsletter, but
for now, suffice it to say that it's some serious Weird Shit, but
without it the sun might not rise the next day.
Present were: me, Graham, Helen, Richard, Galya, Chris, Clive, Wanda, Adrian and Barney.
And while I was writing this entry, Galya emailed me with a short video
of the evening, starting with some footage of a tidy hut (who knew that
was even A Thing?), the new fire, men laying the table, women lounging
by the fire, Barney being adorable etc. I'm the one in the very silly
blue hat. In my defence, it was a) a present b) warm c) damn useful
every time I went for a pee as the light is integral and all I had to do
was press a button for light to appear.
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UBSS New Year at the Hut 2019-2020
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Thanks to
everyone who catered and came along! In particular, thanks to Aunt
Bessie who did the roast spuds. She's not a caver, but we hope to enrol
her next year.
Linda Wilson
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CAVING UNDER THE BRIDGE
No, not the Suspension Bridge. This one's a bit further away.
Jan Walker recently got the chance to do some caving on a trip home to
Texas.
The Natural Bridge Caverns
were discovered on March 27, 1960. The name comes from the 60 foot
natural limestone slab bridge that spans the entrance to the cavern. The
cave temperature is a year-round 22C with a humidity of 99%. The
deepest part of the public tour is 180 feet below the surface, though
group tours of wild caving are done to depths of about 230 feet.
I had the great opportunity to go on the Discovery Adventure Tour,
the wild caving that splits off from the regular Discovery public tour
and goes below for some down and dirty (literally!) scrambling. We
travelled down the public pathway through the main part of the cave on
the Discovery side, and then went over (or through, in some cases) the
railing and down into the depths.
It was fascinating, fun, and very muddy! We started off pristine, and
finished off mud from head to toe. Going through, we climbed a mudslide,
passed through the bat-guano cave where centuries of bats used to nest,
made our way through the Passage of Lost Boots (where the mud was 18
inches deep and very glutinous!), through the crawls and out into a
cavern at the end where we turned our lights off and sat in complete
darkness for a few minutes. It was fascinating how sounds became much
richer when there was no sight at all.
Jan's the one with the proper gear - and the mud.
We then returned by the same route we'd
taken out, this time getting a chance to see the fossil wall where there
were dozens of ammonites, and the pit where some 5,000-year-old bear
bones were found. I also managed to lose my balance a bit and squish my
gloved hand into 5 inches of ancient bat guano. Yum. After that, we slid
back down the same mudslide we'd scrambled up, managing to gather up
even more mud in even more awkward places!
Every cave should have a formation that looks like a llama. Why haven't we got one in Goatchurch?
It's not a difficult trip for an
experienced caver, but for someone who just wants to see something new
and beautiful, it's a great fun trip. The guides were experienced,
informative, and very helpful.
Jan Walker
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SHUTE SHELVE CAVERN - TRIP REPORT
Shute Shelve Cavern, photo courtesy of Paul Willman of the Mendip Cave Registry and Archive.
One of the field trips after the Symposium was Mendip's Shute Shelve Cavern. Liz Green has kindly written this one up for us. This is a good cave for a visit once bat hibernation season ends.
As with many caves, finding Shute Shelve Cavern is harder than exploring
it! On the Sunday of the UBSS Symposium the hardy few met Alan
Gray of Axbridge Caving Group (ACG) who had offered to lead a trip. We
crossed over to the National Trust site on which the entrance is
situated, in pleasant sunshine, and wandered through the woods looking
for the right hole. Maybe we should first have read the description in Mendip Underground?
Alan unlocked and we headed down the entrance passage in a
caterpillar-like fashion, as it’s a bit low in places – not a squeeze,
more of a slither with plenty of room – but unfortunately one of the
party, to his surprise, became claustrophobic and could not be talked
down to the first chamber. After this it’s plain sailing, room to
stand upright as you pick your way over boulders, avoiding the horseshoe
bats and taped off cryogenic calcite crystals looking like snow,
respectively above and below you. Gina Moseley, our other guide, is
researching the cryogenic calcite and talked to us about that.
Alan showed us where he and ACG had been digging as we reached the end
of the easily accessible sections of this interesting ochre mine.
We retraced our steps, the final ascent seemed much easier than the
descent and soon we were sitting among ferns and dried leaves, relaxing
in the sunshine. Thank you Alan.
Liz Green
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MUSEUM NEWS - CONDEMNED!
OK, this sounds more alarming than
it is, but as I had a big shock, I cruelly wanted to inflict it on
everyone else as well, but I could have done without the news, three
days before the Symposium, that the staircase in the Stables had been
condemned as being potentially unsafe. Please read on...
The very short version of a long series of emails, meetings etc is that
the staircase needs to be replaced.The good news is that Estates have a
plan for a new set of stairs and the hope is that they'll go in the same
footprint as the current ones, with some modifications. There will be a
load more site meetings and talks to get us where we want/need to be,
but I can't emphasise too highly that everyone in the uni has been
brilliant about this and have really worked hard to accommodate our
needs etc.
In return, we need to make sure that we play like nice puppies and
respect the reasonable Health and Safety requirements in the meantime.
The short version of a long Risk Assessment that I've not finished
writing yet is ONLY TONY BOYCOTT AND I ARE ALLOWED UPSTAIRS FOR NOW.
Sorry for shouting, but that bit was important. The meeting about this
was funny, as I kept hearing 'Loan Working' and wondering why I needed
an H&S policy for museum loans, only to realise that they meant
'Lone Working' as in being upstairs by yourself! The discussion became a
bit easier once that became clear.
I will need to decommission part of the display area downstairs to
accommodate the works as we will need to move big stuff into the
committee room, which will in turn mean that's not available for use.
The heavy lifting will be done by uni contractors but I will have to
decommission and recommission the displays and some help with that would
be really appreciated. Nathan has already volunteered, but the more the
merrier, please. Any willing volunteers, please drop me and email!
I don't know the timescale yet, but nor does anyone else. Once I know,
I'll tell people. We'll have to be flexiblle, but with that in mind, I'm
as sure as I can be that it'll all work out fine, eventually. And by
now, I think we have a proper No Admittance notice in place courtesy of
Estates, rather than my emergency bodge job.
I know the natural reaction to a lot of this will be 'it's all safety
gone mad', but trust me, it isn't. I've lived with those stairs for
years and they are a pain to manage when I have a building full of
researchers as I had last autumn. So I'm pleading with you all to take
this as seriously as we do underground H&S and all will be fine. For
anyone who doesn't play like nice puppies I will dispense a Paddington
Bear Hard Stare and deploy the UBSS Brick. Or I'll get Haydon to shout
at people and deploy Kettles. Ask Haydon why...
Huge thanks to Tendy Mwarewangepo in H&S, Stu Bellamy (the Site
Safety Advisor in Geography (who once shared a flat with UBSS member
Simon Grace!!), Darren Buss in Estates, the wonderful Richard Baker in
the Estates Assistants office in 21 Woodland Road and the
ever-unflappable David Richards for all their help so far with this!
Linda Wilson
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OVER AND OUT.....
That's all for this issue, folks! If you've read to the end, you're also eligible for A Prize. You know the drill, contact me if you'd like to claim one.
No, Adrian, that doesn't apply to you, you're still on the Naughty Step
from last week. I can't be bribed just with parsnips, mince pies and
lovely dogs. Or maybe I can...
I'm all out of time and brainpower for this issue but there is stuff in
hand for next time, so please don't be offended if material hasn't been
used in this issue. As ever, please keep contributions coming. Levels of
snark and capitalisation might, or might not, return to bearable levels
next issue.
Linda
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