Manchester Hole ‘ Church Pot
Saturday, 21 June 2014
A bit after 10, Chris, Shezi, Sophia and I set off from Leeds towards Nidderdale. The traffic was a lot worse than usual as a result of the cricket. We stopped off at a shop for food for later.
We checked the reservoir at Scar House. Fortunately the water wasn’t too high and was not overflowing. After a quick change at the picnic tables near Goyden, we said goodbye to Chris and Sophia who were going for a walk. After a short walk, we crossed the dry river bed and entered Manchester Hole. Our plan was to follow the route described on the Braemoor website. We scrambled down the boulders at the entrance and set off walking down the large streamway.
Meanwhile, Chris and Sophia were enjoying a sunny walk around Scar House and Angram reservoirs, with not a midge in sight.
The reason for this was that all the midges in Nidderdale were in Manchester Hole and Goyden Pot, happy that two victims had stumbled into their lair.
Batting away the midges, we saw a fish as we continued downstream, through the duck and along Swinton Bypass to Diver’s Chamber. Along the river and through the Eternal Optimist dig, we went back down to the stream, where the entire flow of the River Nidd at this point passes impressively through a passage about a metre wide.
Following the water downstream, we found that the next section did not resemble the description. Eventually, Shezi discovered a damp crawl between boulders which took us into a chamber. We climbed down at the far end into Lesser Stream Passage.
This took us out into the Goyden main chamber. We went downstream to Labyrinth Passage and along the route suggested on the Braemoor website.
Shezi was not particularly impressed with the handline climb down to the New Stream Passage sump pool.
We failed to locate the way to Mud Hall and instead found ourselves at the Ten Foot Climb. We headed down Labyrinth Passage and up the main river passage.
We decided to exit through Church Pot, not only because the description suggested it, but because a large collapse has occurred making the section between the Goyden entrance and the Lesser Stream Passage entrance quite dangerous.
We climbed up the chain and made our way to the surface out of Church Pot. A walk along the road, featuring many flies, took us to the area where Chris had parked.
We got changed and Chris set up the barbecue. Burgers and sausages were eaten, and beer was drunk. An enjoyable time was had by all. The forecast rain never appeared.
Eventually we headed back to Leeds where I caught a train back to York. Thanks to the others for a great day!