Following a protracted discussion, we decided to have a look at Sludge Pit on Sunday.
This cave had been closed for several years, but the landowner gave permission for its reopening a few years ago.
Young Mr Sparrow has been digging down there and has setup an SRT course with laminated numbers to follow.
Finding the cave was the first issue. I had done several years ago and had forgotten exactly where to turn off the lane.
Having found the cave, paid our dues, rigged and descended the entrance pitch, we started looking for laminated numbers.
Keith found one first: 15 - we were going the wrong way!
Returning to the entrance pitch, we went the other way and quickly found 1 to 4 (and another 4), then 9 & 8.
After a long search we found 5 and I headed down a grim dig. Reversing the dig was a bit snug and a mistake as the way on was down the dig and a further pitch.
Rich pushed the dig and got to 6, which Phil had found by another route.
With the tags already found, we quickly got to 12 and a climb into the roof.
I declared that there was no hope of me getting though the squeeze at the top of the climb and went the easy way back the the entrance and on to 15.
The others pushed the passage finding 13 & 14.
When we got back to the hut, my van key was missing, so Ros & I retraced our steps to find the key a short distance into the field.
The cave was muddier than I remembered and we spend a long time trying to get the mud out of our SRT kits, especially the one borrowed from the Wessex.
Team: Keith, Rich, Phil, Ros & Dave
Time: 2h30
