Outdoor Activities all over these last two weeks – from visiting the Trough of Bowland (Geological Survey of a Valley) to the Wensleydale / River Twiss Waterfalls (another Geological Survey) to examining the Limestone Bedrocks at Ingleton. And caving (including a cave survey). Caving is good fun. Interestingly it is a not very widespread thing in the UK with only about 60 Caving Instructors in the whole country whereas people with a Mountain Instructor Certificate come in the hundreds if not thousands. Caving also is limited by the expensive insurance – even though, as one of the instructors put it, caving is mostly about people’s perceived fears (darkness, tight spaces) rather then real dangers (or at least less so than in rock climbing/mountaineering). Of course there is a risk of flooding – particularly in UK caves that usually are active (i.e. have water flowing through them at all times). As with any outdoor activity planning ahead, checking weather reports and having an emergency plan can limit these somewhat.

I can’t really say what makes caving enjoyable for me. Part of it is probably discovering a part of the world and the environment that isn’t easily visible. Part of it are those fascinating views one only gets in an underground environment. Walking through a cave and suddenly coming to a spot that has an opening, the walls covered with moss and grasses – life claiming it’s space, a waterfall feeding the channels that cut the caves, and then re-entering darkness. Part of it is the whole sense of awe of the time spans, the geological history of the places one touches. Caves are ancient spaces. Spaces that are beyond human history, that have a sense of eternity in them. It is an environment that changes only very slowly. On the last day caving we spent time in a quite muddy environment – dry mud that partially started to turn into rock – and likely has been deposited in that cave during the last ice age (there are no signs of flooding, whatsoever) 10.000 years ago. And maybe that aspect of having to bend, flex and use all of one’s body makes part of it – wriggling through a tight space for a couple meters, squeezing around corners, using counter-pressure to stay on that rim, with a large drop below – to traverse from one part of the cave to another … I really can’t say. Other then that I enjoyed my time.

I’ve also learnt an interesting tidbit about the way assignments are constructed here at the uni. There are, apparently, regulations that govern how much words an assignment has to have. That is, for example, an assignment carrying 33% equals a maximum of 1000 words. Knowing that helps appreciate the difficulties in constructing tasks for the courses – and, at the same time, makes it easier to accept what sometimes seems like “impossibly” few words for complex topics. I think I always need to understand the reasoning behind things, understand why something is asked of me the way it is. I like transparency.

I also have to state at this point that the lecturers on this course are accepting and understanding of my needs to a point that is exemplary. I will – very likely – need – in one form or another – some extensions on my work. The general consent among the staff is one of – we’ll help you, think you are intelligent enough to do this, and want to provide support. I am more scared and feeling guilty for asking for help than I should be.

Coming home … I stopped counting after the 50th discarded beer can in the living room. The house was clean and tidy when I left (and after Ed had returned) – with all the others around the same problems as usual return. We’d run out of toilet paper. Instead of buying new ones (buying more alcohol always works) they started using newspaper. Will, as ever so often, passed out sometime Saturday afternoon and didn’t return to the living world until midnight (I was watching Oh Brother where art thou on Film4 in an – for once – otherwise empty living room) when I went to bed. I am worried some about him – drinking and diabetes don’t go well together. That he’s being “abandoned” pretty much by his drinking buddies in that state – doesn’t really point toward healthy friendships, I think.

I am looking forward to moving out, hope to find more mature people and – finally – a room with a window that I can actually look out of. (There are some photos after the “more” tag. Warning! Big!)

-C.

This is the lower of the two Limestone Beds we examined. What happened here is that glacial movement removed the cover of the bedrock and then water cut grykes in it (and leaving clints behind).

A view from inside a gryke.

A top down view.

One of those photos that are so cliche Outdoor Ed

River Twiss valley – before the waterfalls section and an obviously artificially straightened river bed. Shows the typical glacial valley form (with subsequent “softening” through weathering/erosion).

Same waterfall as above (there are several) – the lower part of the rocks are Ordovician slates (which have been uplifted and are at a 76 to 78 degree angle now), with Carboniferous limestones (in there original vertical sedimentary position). The Devonian rocks must have been eroded away before the deposition of the limestone – leaving a “gap” in the geolocial timescale (i.e. an Unconformity).

A close up of a third layer of rock between the two, this time a conglomerate, likely remains of glacial deposits. There’ll be some cave photos later – once the files from the waterproof “indestructible” university cameras have been uploaded.