Alum Pot, Yorkshire Dales

We arrived last night at Clapham to meet Boy in the New Inn. Afterwards, Karen and I followed Boyd back to where we were staying for the weekend which was a bunkhouse at the Dalesbridge Centre near Austwick. Jenny was there as well.
In the morning, the weather forecast for a wet day proved true and Karen opted to join Jenny to go bird-watching on the coast near Morecambe Bay. But first, she wanted to buy some new wellies, so the two of us headed for Bernies to get them while Boyd waited at the bunkhouse for Pete Wagstaff and James Hamilton who were due to arrive this morning. Dave Phillips was also arriving this morning but was to meet us at Bernies.
Jenny arrived a little while later and picked up Karen while I waited for the others. Once we were all ready, we drove out of Ingleton to the hamlet Selside via the road past Ribblehead Viaduct. The road leading to Horton-in-Ribblesdale via Selside had a "Road Closed" sign but I carried on hoping that the closure was beyond Selside and luckily it was.
We parked in Alum Pot Lane and statred getting changed. The plan was for Pete and Dave to abseil down the shorter of the two routes from a tree at the top of the Pot while Boyd, James and I went as far as The Bridge (a convenient large slab which lies at an angle of 50 degrees or so from one side of the Pot to the other part way down) via Lower Long Churn Cave, and I was then to continue to the bottom of Alum Pot with Pete and Dave.
We met a large party of cavers at the climb down near the Cheese Press, and Boyd suggested that I could return back a short distance through the cave and follow the alternative climb down to the same place and he could pass down our gear to me so that I could head onwards to start rigging Dolly Tubs Pitch. By the time I had done this, the other cavers had passed the climb down and so had Boyd and James! Anyway, the other group were luckily only looking at the top of Dolly Tubs pitch and then left us to continue on our way.
I rigged the pitch and Boyd dropped down the remaining two tackle bags. This is a very pleasant route and arriving at the large ledge overlooking the impressive opening of Alum Pot is always impressive. Continuing down the short descent of the Greasy Slab, we continued on across the easy ledge leading to the top of The Bridge. The ledge is easy but a slip would be almost certainly fatal, so it is usually rigged with a protective traverse line.
We continued on down the large, sloping ledge of The Bridge and I started rigging the long drop from underneath the slab while Boyd and James (who is a newcomer to all this Single Rope Technique stuff) started making their way back towards Lower Long Churn Cave. I dropped down the pitch. While abseiling, I looked down and could see Pete and Dave at the bottom in a corner sheltering from the wind and spray of the waterfall waiting for me. Their route was almost direct to where the were from the tree above, so they had arrived long before we did.
Anyway, the 45 metre was only just long enough to reach a large step at the bottom near Pete and Dave and I handed them the tackle bag with the short rope for the final pitch leading to the bottom of Diccan Pot where Alum Pot and Diccan Pot join. I headed back up the rope as Boyd and James would be waiting, and arranged with Pete for he and Dave to de-rig the rope leading up to underneath The Bridge as they continued back the way they had come. I headed after the other two and de-rigged as I went. There was yet another group if cavers at the ledge below Dolly Tubs pitch with more ascending their caving ladder which they had rigged on the alternative hang on the pitch.
I found James part way up Dolly Tubs and started following him and Boyd. Once Dolly Tubs was de-rigged, we started making our way out via the very nice Lower Long Churn Cave with no one falling Plank Pool or Double Shuffle Pool, as happened on the way in...
Once back at the entrance to Lower Long Churn, we found the weather had improved and was a bit brighter with some blue patches in the clouds. Despite the wet weather, including overnight rain, water levels had been as about expected for a normal winter day.
We got changed back into our non-caving clothing and it was back to Bernies for chip butties. Afterwards we returned to the bunkhouse and met Jenny and Karen soon afterwards once they had returned from their trip.