BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?

Subject: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: Mrrzy
Date: 01 Sep 04 - 10:25 AM

I am getting to know quite a group of cavers here, mostly from the Shenandoah Valley Grotto; everyone in the group, and everyone they seem to know or invite to parties, seems totally cool, long-haired nudists galore, is caving the last bastion of total hippie-dom or is it just here? Any cavers on the 'cat, and is your grotto all hippies too?

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 01 Sep 04 - 10:41 AM

Your experience with spelunkers isn't like my experience with spelunkers, Mrrzy. I worked in the Mammoth Cave area in Kentucky, as a cave guide around a lot of folks exploring and researching in the region of the National Park. And I know others from around north Texas at local universities. Sounds like you've encountered a specialized pocket of folks there!

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: GUEST,Sooz(at work)
Date: 01 Sep 04 - 10:55 AM

I wouldn't call myself a caver, but I've been involved with lots of outdoor activities with pupils including some caving and weasling.
I spent my birthday in Gaping Ghyll (Yorkshire Dales) one year and it was great.
Too old and plump now I'm afraid (but still a hippy!)

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: Deckman
Date: 01 Sep 04 - 11:01 AM

Mrrzy ...I was a hard core caver in the Santa Cruz mountains of California for several years. And yes, as you are finding, the caves were full of hard core hippies and nudists. But of course, one must remember, that when I was caving there, it WAS the "Hippie period" in the mid sixties!!!! My, how time flies! CHEERS, Bob

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: sledge
Date: 01 Sep 04 - 11:41 AM

From my limited experience of caving in the Uk's Chedder Gorge, I can only think that nude caving would be an open invitation to hypothermia, it was damn cold down there :-)

Sledge

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: Rapparee
Date: 01 Sep 04 - 12:05 PM

I did it in some caves in West Central Illinois. One thing I learned is that you should never, ever, even consider using a highway flare instead of a carbide lamp or an electric head lamp!

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: Amos
Date: 01 Sep 04 - 12:27 PM

Rapaire:

That sounds like one of those stories I really don't want to know about!! Glad you made it out to fresh air again...


A

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: Sorcha
Date: 01 Sep 04 - 01:23 PM

Best not be too hippy or you won't fit thru the tight spots....



I'll get me coat..

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 01 Sep 04 - 02:11 PM

1. I'm not sure I like the term hippy as it can carry drug use implications.

2. Rock climbing may come close. I remember one night in a pub in Sheffield where I couldn't even understand the conversation, I could pick up on words like "desparate", "severe", etc. but felt I was listening to a foreign language.

BTW, Tim, one of my brothers was arguably the most under-rated/under known climbers in the UK. I think his greatest ever achivement followed Ron Fawcett on the Great Orme putting up a climb of a technical rating of 7a (read exceptionaly hard - few could do it). Tim soloed it (ie used no ropes or protection) the next day.

Jon

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: Deckman
Date: 01 Sep 04 - 02:27 PM

Sorcha ... funny that you should mention that ... about being too hippy! The ONLY scary time I had was when 8 of us went down together. We had planned a 16 hour descent. One of our party, "Harry", was the school vice Principle where I taught. After about ten hours in, we got to a blow tube. I went down first, being the skinniest in those days. Harry came next and plugged the hole.

I was below, he was stuck halfway down, or up, depending on your point of view. He panicked and started threshing around, just getting him himself stuck tighter and tighter.

I was below him, and trapped, but I couldn't quite reach him as I was standing on a ledge above what I had no clue. The fellas above dropped him a rope. With a lot of urging from above, he put the loop in the rope around his wrist. The problem, from above, was that he was just around the bend and out of sight. From below, I could just touch his boot, but I didn't have enough purchase to really push.

The more he yelled and squirmed, the tighter he plugged the hole. Finally he passed out. When that happened, his body relaxed and we got him up.

We took our time getting him out, rested a bunch and really babysat him. We got to the surface at about 20 hours. When we climbed out, there were all the wives, and sheriffses, and the damned press cameras. I broke one camera and the press left.

One of the Sheriffses was a reguliar member of our club, so we had no problems from that angle. But poor Harry. He was so shook up that he took a month off from school, and his hair started turning white ... true!

That was the second to the last trip I ever had down there. CHEERS, Bob (still missing it)

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: GUEST,Anne Croucher
Date: 01 Sep 04 - 03:37 PM

I used to go caving in my youth - with the Portsmouth Polytechnic caving club.

We went to various Mendip caves - I saw the helictites in Fairy Quarry cave before they were taken away. Pretty incredible.

We did Longwood and August, and we had someone collapse and had to drag the unconscious body to the surface up a long chimney. It was only the local cider taking its revenge on the unwary, but it wasn't the best way to spend Sunday morning.

We visited Somerset and found the red clay lining in the caves we visited rather surprising, and it took months to wash out of everything - particularly the boots. The box we kept the caving equipment in was dyed red with the dust working its way into the grain of the wood.

I used to go sailing so I was the chief knot tyer, I got complaints that I secured the biter ends of the bowlins with a half hitch. I didn't stop putting them in, if they had slid there would not have been much point in tying them. If they had slid there would not have been much point in going down to see what had happened to the slidee either.

Happy days

Anne

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: mooman
Date: 01 Sep 04 - 03:40 PM

Used to do some caving and potholing at university, especially in the Burren, Co. Clare.

It's totally outasight!

Peace

moo

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: Fibula Mattock
Date: 01 Sep 04 - 06:17 PM

Aim higher. Go climbing. There is no better way to spend your time than finger-aching crimping on a tiny grit pebble with your last piece of gear waaaaay below you and only adrenalin and faith in friction keeping you on the rockface. Amen.

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: rich-joy
Date: 02 Sep 04 - 01:04 AM

Yes, used to do quite a bit of caving in my yoooth - late 60s - in Western Australia with the WA Speleology Group (WASG) - and yes, many were "into" folk music, same as the Rock Climbers (another group entirely!!!), but maybe in was just "the times" we were livin' in ...

An exceedingly long cave system has just been reported from Oz's Northern Territory, but I forget just HOW long ...

Cheers!
R-J

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: Leadfingers
Date: 02 Sep 04 - 07:02 AM

Mudcatter Zorg ,who is a resident at Herga Folk Club but regularly visits Uxbridge , has a fair number of caving songs in his repertoire . Some damn good stuff too .

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: GUEST,Anne Croucher
Date: 02 Sep 04 - 04:49 PM

Weird weird - I tuned into the BBC Radio 7 site and listened to the last episope of Baldi available on listen again - it was about caving

- though of course it broke all the safety rules.

Anne

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 Sep 04 - 01:32 AM

A spectacular Texas (Caverns of Sonora) helectite. I've visited a lot of caves over the years, but after my years as a cave guide, I've kept my visits to those of paying customer. My climbing activities have all been above ground, in mountains.

On belay!

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: rich-joy
Date: 06 Nov 04 - 01:22 AM

refresh


(perhaps this thread could be linked to the Caving Songs one currently around ?)

Ahhhh ... memories of the fragrant aroma of "Spent Carbide" - nothing quite like it ...


Cheers! R-J

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: frogprince
Date: 06 Nov 04 - 02:08 AM

S.R.S., my wife and I did the three hour "Intro to caving" tour at Mammoth this last spring, with a young lady for our guide. We were the oldest in the group by a few years. No problem, but a good, muddy, workout, and I think I'm too old for the six hour version.
I had done just a little caving years before. One totally undeveloped cave on Guam was easily my "hardest core" experience: entry only by rope ladder down a hole in the middle of one domed chamber, quite a bit of squeezing through tight passages between chambers. Darn it, I never got closer to finding nekkid ladies in a cave than a few girls in bathing suits in a pool just inside one smaller cave on Guam.
I've done a few things nude, but I can't say I've been tempted to go caving nude.

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: muppett
Date: 08 Nov 04 - 04:41 AM

By eck them were the days, setting off for the dales straight after work on a Friday afternoon, getting the train up to Settle, a pint in the Golden Lion then walk up the valley t' Helwith Bridge, put tent up before I got into pub and sup and sing all night, then down t' Bernie'S Cafe in Ingleton for a mug a tea and breakfast, then attempt to go caving, but discover there was a nasty looking cloud over Inglebrough that might caurse a flash flood, so do a walk instead, then back t' Helwith or upto barn at the Hill Inn to watch the band that was on. then back down t' Bernie's Sunday morning then down an easy pot and then call in the Maypole in Long Preston on the way home.
'OH We are the Bradford Pothole club we roam around from pub to pub'

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: Polly Squeezebox
Date: 08 Nov 04 - 08:18 AM

Ah, memories, memories.

About twenty years ago my husband and I came to the same conclusion - loads of people in folk were into caving - and vice versa. As a result of this SpeleoFolk Club was formed. Unfortunately, it only led to one event because our lives were just too busy at the time to organise more at the level that is required to organise mass events underground. Having sent out just 60 flyers for the event, we ended up with 70 odd (very odd some of them!) people underground in Goatchurch Cavern, Mendips, for an eight hour singaround. An absolutely super event, with some wonderful harmonies echoeing from the rock and caverns. All people were properly equipped, inexperienced people were accompanied down and up by experienced cave leaders, everybody left the cave to relieve themselves, the local cave rescue organisations were fully warned in advance and their advice sought and followed. The only surprises were the faces of cavers who didn't know in advance of the event and who were visiting the cave - to suddenly come across 70+ people sat around in the boulder chamber singing their hearts out (but thankfully not raising the roof!) must have been quite bewildering. Everybody had a wonderful time, no damage done to the cave, no accidents. At the end everybody went back to their various areas of Britain, having come from as far afield as Scotland, Isle of Wight, North Wales, and Yorkshire. It must have been the only folk event where the flyer gave the Grid Reference of the venue - not a normal address, yet we still got more people there than the number of flyers put out - how many event organisers wish that was the case with their event?

We're too old to organise the caving side of this now - so how about some younger folkie cavers taking up the challenge and organising a similar event?

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 Nov 04 - 08:13 AM

Yeah! You might actually get me underground for something like that! Virginia has lots of nice caves, too... pity they aren't equipped to hang out in for the next 4 years, *sigh* ...

Subject: RE: BS: Caving: The hippiest sport/pastime?
From: Jess A
Date: 09 Nov 04 - 11:44 AM

I went and sang in a cave the other night actually - some East Midlands local BBC programme was filming a half hour programme about the Seven Wonders of the East Midlands (!! I do not jest!!) and were filming in the Blue John Cavern in Derbyshire in Lord Mulgrave's Dining room (where apparently early victorians used to have dinner parties) and they wanted some music. After a lot of hard work organising on the part of Yorkshire Yankee, Crucible sang there and we're apparently going to be on the telly towards the end of this month. It was good fun although I guess it's not as hard-core caving as most people here are talking about cos it is all concrete steps & hand rails. Amazing acoustics though! We can't get the programme in Sheffield so if anybody in the East Midlands sees it, maybe you could let me know!!