Above: The rubbish freeclimbers unite! Jim Thompson (L), Ben Marks (R)
A prompt 0830 start saw us meet Jim and his van on the lane up towards Titan, and we were soon parked, changed and stomping across the fields towards the shaft. Jim, with a renewed twinkle in his eye after being the recipient of 2023’s ‘most awesome caver’ award (courtesy of Team Awesome!) was excited for the trip, as this would be his first time experiencing the awe of Titan! Jim was first to lower himself into the comparative warmth of the entrance shaft, followed by myself and then Jon. Once I’d landed in the blasted passage at the bottom, I stooped my way over to the window and gingerly waited on the edge looking out into the abyss – it’s a view that never gets old. I had assumed Jim was on the pitch, so waited until I could hear a rumble of a “rope free!” from below. However, soon Jon was sat with me too, and after having a chat for a while we suddenly heard some clanking and a worried sounding voice exclaim “Jon!”. Slightly taken aback by this, we both stared back up the blasted passage, only to hear and see nothing! Weird… Until a rather confused and disgruntled Jim joined us by the window – He’d only gone and somehow turned the wrong way at the bottom of the entrance shaft, and walked in the complete opposite direction to the largest vertical cave shaft in the UK! Oh well, it was his first time…
With all of us past the event horizon traverse, and making that ballsy step of unclipping from the traverse line halfway up Titan, we headed over to the inlet marking the beginning of the Titan Streamway. I’d only ever been to see the first few cascades and never beyond, so I was excited to head up into the streamway proper. It’s such a beautiful bit of cave. White scalloped limestone is clean washed by a lovely flow of clear water. I can see why nobody has ever had the heart to put some handlines in – it’s just so pretty. It’s fair to say that freeclimbing the cascades provided some real challenge for me, and Jim didn’t seem to enjoy them too much either. With gorgeous stream washed limestone cascades comes an extreme lack of hand and footholds, and getting up the cascades was very much dependant on bridging and chimneying up them (as well as some excellent leg ups from Jim and some killer wrist grabs from Jon!). I’d not caved properly for a month or so, and so it was a bit of a struggle to get up these! Worth it though.
Once through what is one of the finest streamways in Derbyshire, a wet flat out crawl is met for a little way, and after some navigational cockups from Jon ‘you cant get lost, its dead straightforward’ Pemberton, we pressed on through ‘Wetsville’, followed by ‘Slopsville’ and then the thrutch up through some boulders to enter a fantastic aven with a handlined climb leading off up towards the Absolution boulder choke. Just fantastic, varied caving which feels completely alien for a peak district trip. I gave the handlined climb a go, but I just felt it was too much risk of me decking it before my physical assessments for the fire service on Wednesday! None of us had a watch either, so it was decided we would turn around. A shame really, as from what I’ve heard the cave really starts to get good from here. Oh well, another reason to return.
The return journey was far more straightforward: It was great fun sliding back down the stream cascades, and felt like we were out canyoning! Jim headed off first back up to the window whilst I scoffed my strategically stashed Double Decker, and Jon and I got very cold whilst listening to the soft tones of Jim leisurely singing and prussiking back out at tortoise speed! As soon as his shout echoed around the void, I shot up the rope and was shortly back at the entrance shaft to find Jim still climbing. All three of us were quickly back up to surface, and chatting about how good the trip was – If only we’d taken some photos, but Jon had forgotten his SD card. Another trip back will be on the cards very soon…
All in all, a fantastic trip to top off what has been a brilliant AGM weekend - I've enjoyed meeting some of the people I've heard so many stories about, and of course being voted in as a full member!
Ben Marks