Taking advantage of the fantastic combination of gorgeous weather and a bank holiday monday, George and I decided to have a quick trip down Hydrophobia and through the sump, with an optional trip down hyperthermia if we were feeling keen.
We had a lazy start and were at the layby by ~12, a quick bob up the hill and we were underground with George taking some pretty nice photo’s of the main gallery whilst I faffed:
(all photos credit to George)
We quickly arrived at the start of hydrophobia (follow the wire) where I took my helmet off, because I get fed up of banging my head on the roof (no helmet incentivizes not doing that). We were soon at the ramp:
where little vertical progress was made.
A quick kit up
saw us at the sump, George headed through and after a few seconds it was my turn;
After this we had a little potter and then headed back through the sump, hydrophobia was particularly enjoyable with my helmet off, as it acted as a parachute in the water pulling me along slightly. Neither of us were keen for hyperthermia so we headed out, but I resolved to come back with a good quality, non-arse exposing wetsuit. Neoprene gloves are also a very good thing; George was able to perform a directly comparative test (neoprene glove vs no neoprene glove) as he only had one.
Out by quarter past 2, a cracking little trip with good company (neoprene gloves are the shit).