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derrickman
50.2% (Neutral)
Newbie Topic Starter

12 years ago

.. seems to have been an issue lately.

Partly because I've just moved my caravan from its site in the Peaks as it was really not getting used and anyway, ttxela insists the Orpeus hut is much better. I'll try it at some point....

http://www.thecoachhousebentham.co.uk/ I'll have to find an excuse to pass by and stop for a pint for old times' sake.

This would have been in the mid-to-late 1970s, I don't know when the club stopped going there. I last went in about 1978.

Before that ( up to about 1972 ) we used to patronise a bizarre and rather squalid old farmhouse run by a local eccentric known as "Cass" who was rumoured to have been involved in assorted political extremism in the 1930s.

I also recall at least one visit to Mendips involving a cramped and dank bunkhouse operated by an early version of the Wealden group, sometime around 1976?

times pass...

''the stopes soared beyond the range of our caplamps' - David Bick...... How times change .... oh, I don't know, I've still got a lamp like that.

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droid
50.2% (Neutral)
Newbie

12 years ago

Late '70s/early '80s my accommodation in the Dales was often a rather sordid little building convieniently situated opposit The Hill Inn.

We called it 'the goat barn'. It's still there i think.

simonrl
51% (Neutral)
Administration

12 years ago

You've not lived until you've camped in the scrapyard at Alston. And walked past the mad chemist's lab through the petrol tank to the showers; beyond the room of dead washing machines.

There are mine tubs everywhere, highly recommended :)

I stayed at the bunkhouse instead... It was the middle of winter!

my orders are to sit here and watch the world go by

derrickman
50.2% (Neutral)
Newbie Topic Starter

12 years ago

I remember the "goat barn", we once used it as a base for a 3 Peaks walk.

''the stopes soared beyond the range of our caplamps' - David Bick...... How times change .... oh, I don't know, I've still got a lamp like that.

Graigfawr
50.2% (Neutral)
Newbie

12 years ago

Sleeping and cooking in the partly roofless chapel half way along the shore of Llyn Cwmorthin.

The Cerberus SS cottage on East Mendip in its latter years when the kitchen had persistent rat problems and whilst cooking you could look up through the remains of long-unsafe first floor, through the fragmentary ceiling, and see a good deal of sky through the missing roof tiles.

I never quite managed to stay at the North Cards Mining Club cottage at Cegynon Mine (living in Aberystwyth, it didn't seem quite worth it) but friends testified to its exceedingly basic nature.

davel
50.2% (Neutral)
Newbie

12 years ago

+1 for the goat barn, and also sleeping in the barn (sharing with a horse) at the back of the Hill Inn (early '70s) before it became a disco.

There was also the HWCPC hut (an ex-chicken shed?) at Braida Garth in Kingsdale, and a fairly squalid building at the back of the Flying Horseshoes opposite the station in Clapham.

Dave

squirrel
50.2% (Neutral)
Newbie

12 years ago

If you're exploring the coppermines, you can't go wrong with Coniston Coppermines youth hostel - which we believe is haunted by old miners........... oh yes, I happen to run it too! Like us at www.facebook.com/yhacoppermines

droid
50.2% (Neutral)
Newbie

12 years ago

And having stayed there I can vouch for the quality of that Hostel... 😉

Trewillan
50.2% (Neutral)
Newbie

12 years ago

"davel" wrote:
+1 for the goat barn, and also sleeping in the barn (sharing with a horse)....
Dave

Central Heating!!!

davetidza
50.2% (Neutral)
Newbie

12 years ago

#10

Listed, in no order of merit:-
a) Caegynon - We used this for 3 or 4 Easters around 1980. On arrival you chased the sheep out, mucked the building out, and then moved in. At that time this part of Wales was dry on a Sunday, but the landlord of the Druids Arms (being a Brummie) would allow English in (but no Welshmen 'they might start singing hymns'!).
b) The Chicken Sheds at Spartylea, near Allendales. A collection of fairly ramshackle buildings with a chemical toilet shed which bore the notice 'When full take to centre of bridge (over the stream) and empty into centre of stream'.
c) Winterings - the hut of the Moldywarps in Swaledale. This was as near a derelict buildings as I have ever paid money to stay in. It was also bitterly cold when we used it, and you could only get anywhere near it with a Landrover.

derrickman
50.2% (Neutral)
Newbie Topic Starter

12 years ago

#11

chickens... what about the "Chicken Shed" at Whernside Manor? Still got my "Whernside welly" caver's boots from the 1970s..... rubber lace-ups with vibram soles. Wore them about 3 times, gave up and hung them in the garage rafters.. still there!

There used to be ( and may still be... ) an isolated club hut, way up the Turbary Road which needed a Land Rover in winter. We used it for Gaping Ghyll trips in the days of massed sherpas and "bottom parties" going underground in late afternoon.

''the stopes soared beyond the range of our caplamps' - David Bick...... How times change .... oh, I don't know, I've still got a lamp like that.

droid
50.2% (Neutral)
Newbie

12 years ago

#12

"derrickman" wrote:
Still got my "Whernside welly" caver's boots from the 1970s..... rubber lace-ups with vibram soles. Wore them about 3 times, gave up and hung them in the garage rafters.. still there!

.

Were those the late, unlamented 'CB'?

Mate had some of those, dead flash he was, till they fell apart at the bottom of Tatty Wife or summat similar.
Oh how we laughed 😉

davel
50.2% (Neutral)
Newbie

12 years ago

#13

"derrickman" wrote:
... "Whernside welly" caver's boots from the 1970s..... rubber lace-ups with vibram soles.

I had a pair of those as well. I quite liked them ...

"droid" wrote:
Mate had some of those ... till they fell apart at the bottom of Tatty Wife or summat similar.

Mine went that way as well, long before the sole wore out. :(

Dave

derrickman
50.2% (Neutral)
Newbie Topic Starter

12 years ago

#14

various views on the subject!

http://ukcaving.com/board/index.php?topic=8547.0

http://ukcaving.com/board/index.php?topic=8155.0

I only wore the Whernsides ( which weren't the same as the CB boot ) about 3 times because I found them so stiff and they nagged around the ankles. I cut slits around the top but it didn't help. I just went back to wearing cheap leather workboots.

The Whernside Welly proper was a vibram-soled wellie. I never had those because ... well, because I was using something else.

''the stopes soared beyond the range of our caplamps' - David Bick...... How times change .... oh, I don't know, I've still got a lamp like that.

Manxman
50.2% (Neutral)
Newbie

12 years ago

#15

In the late 1960's. The Tyn-Y-Groes Hotel just off the A470 on the Trawsfynydd road. The pub was fine (we were allowed to serve behind the bar during the lock-in ... bad move) but had to occupy the chicken shed at the back afterwards - OMG such a bad move. This or in the back of mates Escort van. The van won. But the explore of Gwynfynydd during that and many subsequent weekends made up for excruciating nights of discomfort.
Happy days, (looking back that is!)

Manxman