A previous trip had rigged the Moose Trap and the Ventilator a few weeks previously. We now had to de-rig it, in addition Wayne was going to look at White River passage to update the description of Peak Cavern. At the entrance we split into two groups with the second party waiting a while to avoid queues in the worst parts of the Trenches. So Wayne, Elaine, Donald and myself sped off though the cave leaving the others to follow.
We quickly reached the Treasury, and the familiar crawl started. Happily it seems to be getting shorter and wider and unfortunately in some places deeper! Suddenly sinking up to your knees in liquid mud is not altogether a pleasant surprise. That bit over we quickly climbed to the start of the White River series. Here Wayne made a delicate traverse to the White River passage and with Kevin and Imogen set off to describe the unfrequented passages. The remainer of us (now including Tom and Roy) followed the standard route through to the end of the Kingdom, we were tempted by Heaven, but though better of adding to the cave's destruction. Here Tom and Roy decided to descend Block Hall and exit through Colostomy Crawl etc. Roy needing to be out earlier that the rest of us.
This left Elaine, Donald and myself to descend and de-rig the Moose Trap (which none of us had been down before). The pitches were as described: clean, sharp and rather pleasant, especially the third and largest pitch with it's large deviation. Here Elaine decided to return to the Kingdom, suffering from a late trip down Winnats Head Cave the previous night (she and Glyn had go back to the Chapel around 9pm). This left myself and Donald to reach the bottom, well not quite really - the last pitch, only dropping into a sump, had not been rigged. I de-rigged and we rejoined the remainder of the party ready for the return. The decent required re-rigging the Ventilator etc as a pull-through again, and this and the time taken for Wayne to replace some worn in-situ ropes made for slow progress. Eventually we reached the crawls again. Now the fatigue (not helped by the fact we were now dragging, cursing and kicking the tackle sacks containing all the ropes we had removed) was clearly effecting Elaine who now started singing! The singing, a selection of 'comic' songs, continued much of the way out and may have accounted for the speed with which Wayne forged on ahead.
Altogether a tiring but enjoyable trip, and well worth doing.
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