Alum Pot

19/07/13

In a cunning attempt to get an extra 2 hours sleep on Sunday morning, we headed Saturday afternoon, with the plan of descending Alum Pot.

The cave went smoothly, reaching the sump and Diccan Waterfall via the Alum Pot main hang – a fun airy abseil of some 70m.

However, on the way back to the car, nonchalantly strolling atop a grassy hillock carrying an array of steel ironmongery and reams of wet rope, we were narrowly missed by a pant splitting bolt of lightning which struck an adjacent field no more than 100m away – completely without warning. Suitably terrified we ditched the gear and waited out the rest of the storm at the bottom of a grassy bank, getting piss wet through and far wetter than we had during the actual cave. We can only assume that the lightning strike was a warning shot from Alan Thrippleton – telling us not to be so cocky.

We retreated to the Golden Lion in Horton in Ribblesdale to celebrate our survival before shuffling over to adjoining bunkhouse where we had a pretty rubbish night. (Rob, Mike)

Mike P