Anything is possible.
Caroline negotiates a waterfall in Swildon’s Hole cave, Mendips. Image: Christine Grosart
“We’re just in the bar, I’m the one in the sparkly top!”
And so she was. Not just a sparkly top, but cowboy boots as well!
Chester Storyhouse was beginning to fill up. Caroline Bramwell and I were two of eighteen women selected to ‘star’ in Louise Minchin’s award-winning book “Fearless: Adventures with Extraordinary Women”.
Natasha, Louise Minchin, Caroline Bramwell
Caroline’s story is extraordinary and I won't spoil it too much here, as she wrote a superb book called ‘Loo rolls to lycra’ as well as featuring in a chapter of ‘Fearless’ where she overcame the rather taboo subject of having a stoma.
To many people, having a stoma is of course lifesaving but in a bittersweet blow can also be life limiting and even life ending. A close family friend of mine was so desperate to have his stoma reversed but he embarked on surgery to do it, with devastating results. He succumbed to septicaemia and passed away.
Caroline was diagnosed with Ulcerative Colitis during her pregnancy with her second child and endured this debilitating illness for four years. As a result, her business collapsed; she became confined to her home and was unable to meet with clients, eventually leading to hospitalisation.
The procedure she underwent was a panproctocolectomy, which involves the complete removal of the bowel and the closure of the rectum—often referred to colloquially as having a 'Barbie butt'. Following this surgery, an ileostomy was formed, meaning the stoma is created from the ileum (the end part of the small intestine). In contrast, a colostomy would be made from the large intestine.
Instead of passing waste into the colon and rectum, waste exits through the stoma and is collected in an external pouch.
Caroline's story was one of such severe pain and debilitation that to have what she calls a ‘bag for life’ was the only way to get her quality of life back. And what a way to do it!
Caroline went from being a self-confessed couch potato, to learning how to swim and embark on a triathlon whirlwind.
She was determined to make sure that she was not limited by the lot that she was given and started testing the boundaries of medicine, which to be honest, were pretty outdated and archaic with regards to what an ostomate can do.
I had featured in Louise Minchin's book “Fearless” for my caving adventures. Caroline's eyes lit up when she found out about this.
“I'd love to do that” she said, but likely saw a look of consternation cross my face. Caroline was used to the medical profession casting doubts on her abilities to do anything other than breathe, now that she had a stoma bag for the rest of her life.
But somehow, she had got lucky. Sitting in front of her was not only a caving instructor but a paramedic and someone who was equally determined not to allow any physical setbacks to stop her achieving her dreams.
“Of course I'll take you caving” I said, not really thinking it through. “How hard could it be?”
Our first attempt was completely thwarted by my crashing my road bike during training for an Ironman. Luckily, as an Ironman triathlete herself, Caroline completely understood and we put the trip back a couple of months until I felt able to navigate a basic caving trip. This was still sketchy, as it turned out that I had a torn rotator cuff.
Just to be on the safe side and also to assist with underground photographs, my caving friend Elaine kindly joined the trip to help us out.
I went through my usual pre-cave briefing that I used as an instructor and it wasn't long before both Caroline and I were far more interested in the caving aspect than the stoma issue. The only thing we needed to consider, was the use of an assisted hand line. Quite often novices need this to help them up the near vertical climbs in the cave when they are not used to that sort of thing. This involves wearing either a caving belt or a harness. Obviously, this poses the risk of sitting on top of Caroline’s stoma. So, we spent the evening trying out different configurations and eventually settled on one that would work.
We packed some medical spares in a waterproof caving pot just in case and Caroline took the precaution of taking Imodium for the trip.
We went through the usual jovialities of kitting up into caving gear and looking like Teletubbies with helmets on. Elaine had the most awesome furry suit covered in sheep!
Elaine in her ‘woolly suit’
Caroline and Elaine chatted incessantly as we walked across the fields to the cave and for a moment, I remembered why I enjoyed being a caving instructor so much. I loved hooking people up to the point that I almost became irrelevant and I take pleasure in matching up my friends from all my different walks of life and activities.
Caroline stared at the entrance of the cave, Swildon’s Hole, with much the same trepidation that Louise Minchin had done. The difference being, Caroline was a little bit more aware of what she was getting into and was as excited as she was nervous.
Caroline sets off on her first excursion underground
I dumped the unwieldy camera box onto Elaine and we slithered our way down the cave, following the water and Caroline took it all in her stride.
It wasn't long before we met the first obstacle - Jacob’s ladder, where I needed to apply a harness and a hand line. Caroline managed this without any bother at all and we set off into the cave, watching her settle in and enjoy the scenery more and more as she went.
I played my usual trick of taking photographs on the way out, as this gives cavers a bit of a break from the uphill climb to the surface. In caving, what goes down has to come up and I always warn novices that as soon as they start to feel a little weary on the inward journey, it is time to turn for home. The outward trip is usually way more energetic.
Elaine climbing a cascade
Caroline stared into the black abyss as she looked down the 20 foot pitch, our turning point. I could see that she was keen to come back another day and perhaps go all the way to the sump. This meant a doubling in distance, time and difficulty of the trip.
We turned tail at this point and headed back, stopping on the odd occasion to have a snack and take some photographs.
Lying face down in a waterfall in the dark, posing for photos, I think Caroline at this point had completely forgotten about her stoma! I think we all had.
We surfaced as darkness started to fall and as we were all wet, it made sense to keep the chill off Caroline by wrapping her in a survival bag.
I can never understand why people carry survival bags but don't use them. The foil ones are useless but the big orange plastic ones make an immediate difference to your temperature, especially walking back across the fields in the wind. I simply dry it off, fold it up and use it another day.
Caroline reported after the trip that she was covered in bruises and aching from head to foot, but that she’d had the most brilliant day and her daughter was keen to give it a go as well. Whilst I may not have been able to convert Louise Minchin into the joys of caving, I had at least had some success in converting this triathlete, despite her medical hurdles to overcome, into being a caver.
Caroline in `Swildon’s Hole. Image: Christine Grosart
Dartmoor
It is a pretty miserable way to spend the winter, stuck indoors, with the wind and the rain lashing at the windows. Having fallen off my bike, with an injured arm, I was pretty limited as to what I could do. But, in typical Christine style, given my legs were still working and cabin fever was most definitely setting in, I needed an adventure.
Sometimes, something just goes off in my head, and I have to get out of the house. I grabbed a map, a rucksack, my lightweight camping gear, a stove and some snacks, then hopped in the car and headed straight for Devon.
I'm hugely into wild camping at the moment, albeit mostly from my sea kayak. But sea kayaking wasn't really an option as I could barely lift and hold my arm for a few seconds. I decided to head out to Dartmoor. I have quite a history with Dartmoor, having done the Ten Tors two years running as a child. It is a magical, mythical place. There are a few places that I'd never been or at least could not remember visiting. I had avoided Burrator Reservoir as it's something of a tourist trap. I don't think I'd ever been to Crazy Well Pool either. So, I created a little route that took in all of these sites and set off walking from Princetown.
It was a foggy, murky morning. I'd recently bought myself some Shokz headphones, mainly for swimming training. They were the perfect accompaniment to my morning’s walk. And I decided to scare myself silly by listening to the audio book of The Hound of the Baskervilles, which I had not read since I was a child. It was seriously atmospheric, listening to the words of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, complete with sound effects of the howling hound, as I trudged into the thick mist across the silent moor.
I will forever be grateful that I was taught the old school way of navigation. I'm super comfortable whipping out a map and compass to pick my way through the fog. When I was training with my school friends on the moor, we didn't have mobile phones back then. GPS devices were in their infancy, and we weren't allowed to use them in any case.
Nowadays, we are spoiled with Google Maps, Komoot, Strava and all manner of walking apps, not to mention my Garmin trustily strapped to my wrist as if it were part of my body. We are spoilt for choice as to which navigational aid to use. But the only one I ever truly trusted was my map and compass, which I would pore over obsessively, checking out contour lines, rocky features and trying to figure out if the pile of rocks looming ahead was the Tor I was looking for…or perhaps it was the next one.
My shoulder didn't seem to mind carrying a rucksack. I always use walking poles when I'm out in the hills or on the moor. They're great for stability, save me from tripping over when I'm top heavy and they're great for testing the depth of bogs and rivers.
The first day I only covered 13 kilometres, which was pretty pathetic in comparison to the distances I was doing in training for Ten Tors, where often we would cover up to 20 miles a day.
Crazy Well Pool
The weather was dank and a little bit grizzly, but I was just delighted to be out and doing something in the outdoors. I visited Crazy Well Pool and then carried on to Burrator Reservoir. Both were annoyingly busy, so I headed away from the road up towards Sheepstor, which seemed a reasonable place, off the beaten path to spend the night.
I'm one of these sad people who get really excited about camping kit. I love trying new camping meals, the latest camping gear and trying out various ways of keeping warm during the night.
In the Ten Tors of 1996, there was heavy snowfall and high winds all across the moor. I woke up in the middle of the night to an enormous slab of snow that had dumped itself in the entrance of our tent. Luckily, we had made really good progress and we're already on our way back up the moor towards Okehampton when, unknowing to us, the event had been called off. It took everything we had to finish the event, and we completed it in good time and received our medals. The rivers had burst their banks and, in an attempt, to jump one of them I become completely submerged. I think everybody was on the brink of hyperthermia and many of the children that year we're either airlifted off the moor by Chinook helicopters or simply could not be rescued and were forced to spend another night up on the Tors with the Army.
Cozying up for the night on Sheepstor during a relatively mild winter was a bit of a doddle in comparison. Not only that, but I was older, wiser and had a significantly better kit!
I put up a few social media posts sharing my little womble and was a little disappointed in a few folk, who seemed horrified that I was sleeping out by myself. It really was the easiest and nondescript overnight camp that I think I’d ever done, but somehow it filled them with utter terror on my behalf.
Perhaps it just takes a lot more to convert excitement to fear for me, but at no point did it cross my mind that anything I was doing was in any way unsafe. There didn't seem to be any logic to what they were saying. “But what if something happens to you, what if you get injured, what if you get ill?”
Wow. If I lived my life by all those ‘what ifs’ I would be sitting on my sofa right now wrapped in a serious amount of cotton wool.
There's something about being self-reliant, well organised, planning for all eventualities and leaning on all my experience, that means that the likelihood of any of their fears coming to fruition is extremely unlikely.
And in any case if they did, I would have done everything in my power to sort myself out before requesting help. I’m a Paramedic, after all…
What it did show me was that there is a huge spectrum of what people consider to be acceptable risk and what they consider an adventure to be. I'm loathe to call this weekend an adventure because honestly, it was just an easy walk with a little bit of camping.
In my world, I think the word ‘adventure’ was even a little bit extravagant. But to some people the concept of going out onto the moor camping alone was just a step too far. I tried not to let it annoy me and spoil my weekend and reminded myself that this was a reflection on them and their lives - not mine.
At about 2:00 in the morning I heard some voices.
What the actual hell?!
I come all the way up here into the back of beyond to be alone and yet here we are - people!
The voices passed very close to my tent and then faded as they went around the edge of the Tor. There was the rustling sound of tent material and then silence.
When I woke in the morning, I had a mooch about and bumped into two young lads who arrived very late at night ready to start climbing in the morning. We exchanged pleasantries over coffee, and they set about trying to climb the extremely greasy, lichen covered granite. I pulled a face; rather them than me and I packed up my tent ready for the second phase of my walk.
On the way down from my camp, I bumped into a very pleasant gentleman walking his spaniels. We had a long and pleasant chat which culminated in him enthusiastically telling me about a sign on the church door, down in the village of Sheepstor.
I almost didn't bother going but it was such a short deviation that I popped up to the pretty little church to take a look.
There was nobody around and the whole place was dead. I walked up to the church door and found the sign that he was talking about which, no word of a lie, actually moved me to tears.
I'm not a religious person and as I've got older, I do feel a little resentful at the amount of time I was forced to spend at church concerts, sitting on a hard floor in my primary school singing hymns instead of learning maths, where I struggle, and going to confirmation classes, which was a complete waste of my childhood.
The sign was so moving that I was almost tempted to push the door and go inside. But I just couldn't bring myself to do it. So, I turned my back, walked away and continued on my journey, thinking about everything that sign meant.
I covered about 15 kilometres more, working my way back around Kings Tor back into Princetown. It was hard going under foot mostly on the old railway lines and my feet were definitely starting to feel the lack of walking over the years.
The dark shapes of Dartmoor ponies came out of the gloom and disappeared back into the mist along with the occasional highland cow and dog walkers, who didn't seem to stray very far from Princetown. As I approached my car, the soggy blues and pinks of Christmas lights in the drizzle greeted me. I had hoped for golden, crisp, frosty mornings and blue skies, but they seem to be a thing of the past in England now.
I promised myself that I wouldn't leave it so long next time and given that Dartmoor is barely 2 hours away from home, there really isn't an excuse not to visit more often.
Fearless do Kendal
Louise Minchin, Caroline Bramwell, Christine Grosart, Cath Pendleton, Imogen Sykes
“Reveille Reveille Reveille!”
Cath Pendleton’s strong Welsh accent reverberated through the Fearless house.
Christ on a bike. Was it that time already?
We were all getting up to go swimming in Lake Windermere. In November. In the rain. As you do….
The Fearless gang, some of us anyway, had headed up to the Kendal Mountain Festival for a weekend of cycling, swimming, running, kayaking, watching inspirational talks and films, catching up with friends and getting Louise Minchin tipsy, so she had to run a 10km off road race with a hangover!
The weather was its usual November offering in the Lake District – grey and drizzly. Not put off, a gang of us headed North with bikes, kayaks and our tow floats and moved into an Air BNB for a long weekend.
The Ice Queen ‘Merthyr Mermaid’ Cath Pendleton swims in Windermere
I was super keen to go for a bike ride with Caroline Bramwell, who wrote ‘Loo Rolls to Lycra’ – her ironman journey with a stoma. I was also keen to go swimming with Cath Pendleton, known as the Merthyr Mermaid. If you haven’t seen the documentary about her Antarctic swimming, it’s an absolute must. No wetsuits here. She did it in her cozzie.
I’m not into this ice swimming lark so I took my wetsuit, which I was still getting used to. This didn’t stop the snatched intake of breath when I put my face in the water. It was cold. Very cold.
I put Caroline, who had done her swim, into my sea kayak so she could shoot some video. With her hands tied up with cameras, she started to drift down Windermere as she handed me different sets of swimming goggles to try on. My open water ones leaked, so I was after another pair.
While Cath was off networking at the festival, Caroline and I set off for a cold and really rather hilly bike ride. Our plans to cross Windermere with our bikes and ride down the opposite side of the lake were thwarted when a big sign said the ferry was closed. Arse.
Ladies that do cycling
Caroline Bramwell and Christine Grosart
This meant a bit of a different route, taking in a main road with quite aggressive traffic but we managed and finished our 39-mile ride in the nick of time to get back for a shower, change, quick slap of makeup and a taxi into Kendal for Louise Minchin’s gig on stage.
Safely in the VIP lounge at the festival, we prepared to go on stage. I was feeling much less nervous as there is nothing like having done something before, to quash the fear. Something I reiterated when Louise asked her ‘panel’ how to manage fear. Fear isn’t necessarily a bad thing – it keeps you alert and aware as to what can go wrong. Fear can be healthy. But when fear turns to terror, that is the time to call it a day.
I’d spoken at Kendal in 2018 and knew the audience would be kind. I’d also spoken on Fearless in Chester at the book launch, so with these under my belt and with a great presenter, we were in safe hands.
Cath Pendleton, Christine Grosart, Caroline Bramwell, Louise Minchin
Our view from on stage
Flanked by Caroline Bramwell and Cath Pendleton, we were more like Fearsome than Fearless, and the session was fun and heart-warming. What I hadn’t banked on was a book signing afterwards. Fully expecting to leave that to Louise and sneak away to catch my caving friends over at the Petzl Underground Session, I got roped into also signing the books as the queue spilled out of the door. Cath and Caroline were well ahead of the game and had wonderful little straplines to write alongside their signature.
Armed with a sharpie, feeling a total fraud, I just signed my name. This was not at all what I was used to, and I could see Caroline was struggling with the same imposter syndrome.
Cath got around her nerves by talking to everyone at length and making the queue go even slower. It was exhausting and humbling.
Finally, book signing done, we headed to the local Pizza express for a well-earned meal and drink, catching up with the ladies from Her Spirit too.
The group thinned out a bit as we went on a bit of a mission to find a nice pub afterwards.
It was of no consequence to us that Louise had a 10km trail running race to do the next morning, as we continued to top up her wine glass.
Trying to hide Louise Minchin in a pub takes quite some doing and it wasn’t long before folk started staring and whispering and one slightly worse for wear held her captive in a one-way conversation for a while.
I can’t imagine being so famous that you are recognised wherever you go. Thank goodness for online shopping I’ll bet!
We spent the last day of the festival actually watching some films and talks we had planned to see. I particularly enjoyed finally meeting Jenny Graham and hearing about her round the world cycling endeavours. As the weekend drew to a close we all headed home in the grizzly weather exhausted, motivated and with plans afoot for more fearless adventures together.
Fearless
In the summer of 2022, I received a message out of the blue from Louise Minchin.
A quick Google to jog my memory, as I’m not a big viewer of morning telly, and I recognised her straight away.
Take a moment to watch this:
Louise had delivered the daily news from the BBC Breakfast red sofa for many years, getting up before the sparrows to provide that familiar, friendly face that everyone takes for granted while they get ready for work.
Louise was writing a book about amazing women doing amazing things. My immediate reaction was to cringe and pull a face. I don’t consider myself amazing nor what I do as amazing, especially among my peer group which comprises cavers and cave divers significantly better than me.
Louise and her team had been doing their homework and wanted me to take her caving, something she had never done before, and she was super excited about it.
Louise Minchin tries caving. Image: Christine Grosart
Trying to line up two very busy women’s schedules was a battle, but we got there. Louise did brilliantly in her first trip underground, not least because she had kept a lid on her very real fear of claustrophobia throughout.
Almost a year on, following several more adventures with some amazing women, Louise was ready to launch her book, ‘Fearless’.
I was invited to a book launch in Chester, which wasn’t really on my route home from my trip offshore on the diving vessel, Seven Kestrel. Even worse, the ship was due to crew change in Great Yarmouth. This was going to be a hire car job, going round the houses to get to Chester before heading south back home to Somerset.
My office. DSV Seven Kestrel.
Luckily our crew change was on time, and I started driving. I didn’t really have any nice clothes and no time to go shopping. I wasn’t too worried as it was only a book signing, probably in the front window of the local WH Smith or something.
As I got closer to Chester, the WhatsApp messages started to ping about.
“Is there anywhere to change?” I asked, fully expecting to change in the car park.
“Oh yes you can use my dressing room” Louise said. How posh I thought. They have a dressing room in WH Smith? Perhaps it was a Waterstones.
Who knew?
As I got within a few hours of arrival I re-routed my sat nav to the address Louise had given us all. The Playhouse, Chester.
Hm. That’s not a bookshop.
I parked the car and walked into quite a large building. It soon became apparent that Louise had booked the whole thing. It also became apparent that the throngs of people gathering at the bar had all come to see her – and us!
Louise Minchin - ready to launch her book.
We were going to be on stage to talk about our respective chapters in her book.
Oh crikey.
I ran up to her dressing room – which had lamps all around the mirror and everything – and had a quick shower and tried to look presentable. Not easy when you have been at sea for a month and up since 6am.
Note to self – don’t complain to a BBC Breakfast presenter about early mornings!!
I managed to find some of the other women in her book.
Caroline Bramwell sent her description over WhatsApp, and I found her and a few others at the restaurant table.
Caroline had taken up Ironman distance triathlons in later life, having been a self-described couch potato. But that wasn’t the end of the story. Caroline had suffered for many years with ulcerative colitis. After years of suffering, she ended up with a stoma bag.
This is something that many people would feel was life limiting, even life ending – there were people in my family and family friends who had stomas, some with devastating outcomes.
They certainly hadn’t taken up triathlon soon after.
Caroline was a true inspiration and kindly sent me a copy of her book ‘Loo Rolls to Lycra”. Between her and Louise Minchin, I was hooked on the idea of triathlon. Now that I had learned to ride a bike, there was no excuse anymore.
Also sitting at the table were women who had yet to reach my radar. Shamefully (but not my fault) ‘Fearless’ had been sent to my house – but I had not seen my house for a month!
I had not had the chance to read it. I had absolutely no clue who these women were or what part they had played in Louise’s mission to celebrate women doing incredible things.
The whole thing had come about because someone had pointed out to Louise that, whenever BBC Breakfast came on, her male co-host would always introduce the programme, followed up by the female co-presenter Louise, playing second fiddle. When Louise challenged the BBC about this, they said it was because ‘that’s the way it has always been’.
Not really good enough.
Furthermore, Louise was getting tired of hosting men who had done world record this or adventurous that.
Where were all the women?
Weren’t they doing these amazing things or were we just not hearing about them?
The calm before the storm. Signing as many books as she physically can.
Louise went on a mission to find out who these women were, doing the business and to celebrate their achievements; from swimming the channel to the most southerly ice mile; swimming Alcatraz to free diving under ice – in the dark – to cycling across Argentina and of course, caving with me!
It took a while to sink in that there were quite a lot of women out there doing hard core things, amazing things, fearlessly all over the country and the globe in fact – but Louise had whittled them all down to just 18 women. And I was one of them. In fact, until I sat here writing this, that had not really registered at all with me.
Louise Minchin, Caroline Bramwell, Lucy Gossage, Rhian Mannings
I Googled the book and read the reviews from Waterstones book shop.
It had been read by Sir Chris Hoy and Dame Kelly Holmes! They had read about my cave diving adventures. That was just bizarre. I do rather like Dame Kelly Holmes…
Wow - I loved this book. What a wonderful celebration of women's courage, resilience and endeavour. ― Dame Kelly Holmes.
I made my way up to Louise’s dressing room, where she was surrounded by her close entourage and half buried in a landslide of copies of her book, as she tried to sign as many as she could.
After a time, we all started to make our way to our seats in the rather large theatre.
It was packed.
Louise found it hilariously funny that I still thought the whole affair was going to be in a high street book shop!
Whilst the Fearless ladies got deep into conversation, an older gentleman, dressed in tweed and with pink trousers, very well spoken, approached us and asked what our roles were in the book.
“Who’s he?” we mouthed.
“I dunno. Just play along…”
We entertained him for a bit, still wondering who he was and why he was asking so many questions.
A while later Louise appeared out of nowhere and swooshed in to give him a kiss and said “Oh you’ve met my Dad!!”
Let the ground please swallow us up, whole…
It turns out Louise’s Dad is the epitome of the word gentleman and I felt a pang of slight jealousy that her father was so interested in everything she did and was so proud of her. I guess not all fathers are made the same.
Louise was introduced and soon came on stage looking amazing and relaxed as she always does, well-polished after 20 years on live TV.
I looked like something the cat had dragged in.
We were going to be called on stage in groups of four and with no briefing at all, invited into discussion about our respective chapters in the book.
There was method to this madness. Louise wanted an unbriefed, honest discussion with the women in her book and we trusted her entirely to lead us through it and she would never trick us or trip us up.
Louise Minchin, Kadeena Cox, Cath Pendleton, Vivienne Rickman
The evening was incredibly enjoyable and as it went on, all the women in the book, as well as the audience, were being incredibly inspired.
My mind started whirring about what things were possible and how I’d limited myself to being a cave diver by identity and a jockey in a previous life.
My second ride over fences, age 21.
I realised that nobody needed to be pigeonholed as only one thing, that nobody is identifiable by just one thing they’ve done. I suppose it is a bit like being typecast; everyone knows Louise Minchin for being on that BBC red sofa but to me, she was identifiable by being an GB triathlete age grouper who had pretty much started from scratch.
Like me, she had been heavily involved in sport as a youth and we had both abandoned it for different reasons.
My previous life.
It opened up my mind in the most incredible way. I knew I’d gained a lot of weight over the years, with no real goal or target to aim at and the only sport I did was really diving.
Once I’d started cycling it created so may new opportunities for me and the weight started to come off.
But I was still held back by my personal life, where I was deeply unhappy. I couldn’t really be myself unless I was by myself.
I was fed up with conforming to what other people wanted when they gave so little back. My remaining family were much the same – only bringing problems and no positivity at all. So, I created distance there as well.
With my newfound freedom, having removed the ‘mood hoovers’ as I call them, my whole world opened up in front of me and I could breathe again.
Lucy Gossage, an oncologist and ultra-runner and triathlete, winning Ironmans and all sorts, put it very well when she said that she was so lucky to have a body that functioned and allowed her to do these things. She saw being able to do things that other people find too hard, was a privilege and she almost felt it was a crime not to take advantage of that.
Don’t mess with this lot! I don’t know how many GB medals, ironmans or channel crossings are in that lot, but quite a few!!
I came away from that incredible evening slightly hungover and incredibly motivated.
It gave me permission to be me again.
And for that, I cannot thank Louise and the other 17 Fearless women enough.
In chapter order:
1. Anaya and Mitali Khanzode – Escape from Alcatraz
2. Christine Grosart – Wild Caving
3. Cath Pendleton – Freediving Under Ice in the Dark
4. Belinda Kirk – Overnight Dartmoor Crossing
5. Zainab (Zee) Alema – Rugby
6. Sophie Storm Roberts – Cycling
7. Mollie Hughes – Mountaineering
8. Caroline Bramwell – Long Course Triathlon
9. Lucy Gossage – Team Hike Bike and Paddle Board
10. Vivienne Rickman – Mountain Swimming
11. Kadeena Cox – Indoor Track Cycling
12. Rhian Mannings – Hiking
13. Mimi Anderson – 1200km Cycle Across Argentina
14. Lizzie Carr – Stand Up Paddleboarding
15. Anoushé Husain – Indoor Climbing
16. Rhiane Fatinikun – Hiking
17. Susie Chan – Ultrarunning
To be a Fellow
"Dear Miss Grosart,
I am writing to confirm your successful application for Fellowship of the Royal Geographical Society (with IBG)."
Well.
That's not something I ever expected!
Someone at work asked me why I explored caves. What did I get out of it?
They didn't see the attraction.
There's no money in it. In fact, it drains your own personal finances. No prestige.
No job prospects. No gold medal. Rarely any recognition other than the occasional nod of approval from your mates in the pub that night.
You get to call a piece of this planet your own for an unknown period of time - until that is, another human goes there after you. Until then, it's yours.
But honestly? Nobody really cares.
The Royal Geographical Society (RGS) is the United Kingdom's learned society and professional body for geography, founded in 1830 for the advancement of geographical sciences.
Today, it is the leading centre for geographers and geographical learning.
The Society has over 16,500 members, with its work reaching the public through publications, research groups and lectures.
Through my work with Ghost Fishing UK, I had come to the attention of Paul Rose, the popular explorer, former vice president of the RGS and tv presenter.
My CV, which was rather rather unsung, showed many years of cave diving exploration in France and Croatia.
Chris preparing to push the sump at the end of the Garrel
I was mapping new, uncharted territory in stunning underwater caves across Europe but very few people knew of it and even less cared.
One of my favourite pastimes is making films about exploration. I want to share our discoveries and show the diving world what goes into virgin exploration, going literally where no other human has ever been.
I never take myself too seriously though - it is meant to be fun after all! There is usually a healthy selection of outtakes to bring me back down to earth.
It meant the world to me and that's why I do it.
The primary reason for Paul's interest was the charity Ghost Fishing UK which was ground breaking, with the largest single collective of divers in the world, the first training course in the recovery of ghost gear and a powerful database of locations, types and impact of ghost gear in British waters.
Run entirely by volunteers, it had changed the lives of over 70 divers and was starting to make a real impact on the perceptions of the marine environment and the damage ghost gear can do, to not only the diving world but the general public.
A long standing, massive issue that was largely taboo and very much hushed up and overlooked, was now being exposed.
An estimated 640,000 tonnes of fishing gear is lost into our oceans on a global scale each year. Whilst great strides and efforts had been made to manage fish stocks and sustainability, huge fuss being made about super trawlers and fighting over fishing grounds...the fact that every commercial fishing vessel has at some point lost or abandoned fishing gear to the ocean to continue ghost fishing, had not even been considered.
My role in the charity covers lots of areas. I set out as a trustee and secretary, while my underwater role tends to always be videography and photography. An image speaks a thousand words, especially to the non diving public, so this is an area I am quite devoted to. I also make films, short AVs and documentaries about Ghost Fishing. I do all the press releases and connect with the fishing communities and make hard won friends and connections who are nervous of our intentions. I call myself the charity ‘dogsbody’.
Ghost Fishing diver. Image: Christine Grosart
I've taught myself all about sound recording, underwater videography, lighting and getting the most out of Adobe Premiere Pro.
I hate not being able to do something - if I can't do it, I have to go and learn how!
It took months and months of work to build, write and test the Ghost Fishing UK training course.
Run over 3 days it is designed to turn carefully selected divers into Ghost Fishing divers, who can work safely as a tight team, in close proximity to ghost nets.
It is immensely satisfying work but very, very time consuming and I admit to struggling to combine both cave exploration with running a charity full time and holding down a high profile job for a significant company offshore.
But hey, you're only on this planet once, I believe, so it is my mission to make the most of it and record as much as I can for posterity, inspiration and creating fond memories to look back on.
Manic Media
I was delighted to get a call much sooner than expected, to join my second home the DSV Boka Atlantis, for an emergency job in the North sea.
A pipeline had liberated itself from the seabed so we were off out to fix it with our hotshot team of sat divers (cue the A-Team theme tune…)
Coming home from weeks away offshore is like Christmas every time – there is always a bunch of parcels you forgot you ordered waiting for you.
One such parcel was particularly exciting for me. Owing to the charity work I do for Ghost Fishing UK and original cave exploration, which is my life’s passion, Santi Drysuits offered me an ambassadorship.
Christine in her new Santi Drysuit. Images by Marcus Blatchford at Vobster Quay
It is an honour to be asked by a top end drysuit manufacturer who truly believe in supporting our charity and supporting those volunteers not just at the sharp end but who graft so hard for no remuneration behind the scenes.
The media have been busy with our charity and the BBC Women’s Hour Power List 2020 has kept on following me and they finally persevered and caught up with me when I got home for an interview.
You can listen in here:
Not long after, BBC South West nabbed me for a piece about volunteers who look after our southern coastline.
A slightly stranger one was being asked to talk about working offshore for Woman and Home magazine. They were quite insistent that the interviewee should be 40 or older and never appeared in a similar magazine. I was quite sure that this was not my genre but sadly even more sure that I had, indeed, hit 40. This milestone was a total anti-climax and due to Covid had been spent on the oil rig, Dunlin.
You can read the full article online here: Woman and Home - Women at Sea
I didn’t tell anyone it was my birthday as it seemed pointless. I guess the party will have to wait a while.
In the run up to my first ‘live’ ghost fishing mission of the season, I jumped into our local quarry with photographer Marcus Blatchford and fellow Cave Diving Group member Connor Roe.
I hadn’t seen Connor since his efforts in Thailand assisting with the underwater rescue of the Wild Boars football team.
By the way, if you want to read all about it from the horse’s mouth, I highly recommend this read from one of the guys who found them. It’s probably the only truthful account of the whole affair you will read.
I’m proud to know both Rick and Connor, Rick much better over the years and they are the most down to earth people you could ever meet.
Connor Roe, with one of his less fortunate victims…
Photo: Christine Grosart
We had a lot of fun with scooters and cameras and I got to try out my new Paralenz Vaquita. I had a good shakedown with my DSLR wide angle underwater set up in preparation for the Brighton Ghost Fishing UK mission where I hoped to bring back some images of the action.
Underwater photography: Expensive, difficult and time consuming!
Christine in her new Santi Drysuit. Images by Marcus Blatchford at Vobster Quay
Christine in her new Santi Drysuit. Images by Marcus Blatchford at Vobster Quay
"You scared the sh!t out of me!"
I made a hasty exit from the 7 degree sump, wondering why I couldn’t have chosen a different hobby…
Izvor Licanke - class of 2021.
It was an early start in the Licanke house.
Anton and I didn’t mess about getting changed and heading into the cave, arriving in plenty of time to dive sump 2.
Anton elected to follow me as he had never dived this sump and it was milky visibility. Fortunately one of my back up lights has a mind of its own and often decides to turn itself on at depth. This gave Anton a welcome ‘lighthouse’ to follow in the gloom as we crossed the sump and we soon met our scooter drop, somewhat prematurely, and swam to the surface to de-kit.
As I surfaced, the dive line felt a bit flimsy in my hand. I grabbed onto it so as not to de-rig Anton and at that moment, it snapped just above the water’s edge.
That was lucky.
I waited for Anton to get out of his gear. He could see what had happened and in silence I repaired the line and we started moving our gear through the dry cave.
After a few journeys to sump 3, we had a brief chat before setting off through the sump. It only takes 4 minutes to cross sump 3. Anton was on a mission and had got all his gear to sump 4 before I had even exited the water.
He got into sump 4 first and reached up for his bailout bottle, which was lying on a ledge just above the water. The bottle seemed to catch on something and as he pulled it towards him, it nose-dived violently straight onto a sharp flake of rock. A loud hiss and puff of gas was followed by silence.
Oh shit.
The rock had taken a chunk out of Anton’s regulator hose.
I stared at it in disbelief. This cave had bitten just about everyone in one way or another and now even Anton had not escaped its clutches.
Bugger.
Anton declared he could fix the hose back at sump 2, but could not dive any further into the cave.
It was down to me now.
As before, there was nobody who could come and get me in the event of a problem.
I got into sump 4, clipped off my line reel ready for deployment and set off. I knew that the line went about 100 metres distance, dipping to 28m depth, before it ended at about 10m. After that, who knew what it would do?
It took a while to get to the end of the well-laid line. I was taking it steady and trying to get a feel for this sump. It was much like the other sumps; sandy, undulating floor with the occasional jagged rock here and there. I found the end of line with some of it bundled neatly under a big rock. It was safe and secure, so I tied into it, feeling huge relief that finally we were getting somewhere.
The cave gradually undulated shallower and I was laying line at about 10m depth through easy going, large passage when I suddenly hit a huge, vertical wall. Looking left and right, I could see no ongoing passage - the only way was up.
Laying line up a sheer wall on a manual rebreather is tricky. I took my time, making small tie offs wherever the opportunity arose and there weren’t many of them. As I got to about 4m depth I started looking up and sure enough, there was the glistening ripples of air surface. I bobbed to the surface only to crack my helmet on a roof projection.
Arse.
Moving away slightly to the side, I was now floating in a perfectly round, turquoise pool.
Where the hell was the way on?
Just across the pool was a large flake of rock slicing across my view of the otherwise circular sump pool. That must be it.
Swimming carefully on the surface over to the rock flake, I stuck my nose around the corner.
There lay a perfect de-kitting ramp, a flat stream passage with cream, orange and black walls and a ledge which looked like a perfect de-kitting bench!
Brilliant!
I de-kitted, turned off all my bottles and wandered down the brand new stream passage. The roof was about 30 metres high, the passage was a couple of metres wide, bigger in places and the stream flowed gently towards me under my feet.
It was beautiful and for that moment, it was all mine. My own piece of planet earth that nobody else had ever seen. It had never seen light, never been walked on and I had no clue how long this would last.
As I walked down the easy going passage, stopping to have a good look up into the tall roof, I let out a “Woo Hoooooo!!” of delight. At this point, I realised I had left my Paralenz dive camera clipped off to the nose cone of my scooter in sump 2.
I didn’t actually mind at this stage and concentrated on not tripping over and hurting myself, or putting a hole in my drysuit.
It was far too soon but some 70 metres later, I came across another perfectly round pool of turquoise water.
I walked straight into it to check if it was a lake, a duck or a sump.
It was a sump.
This was the cave that kept on giving. I had found sump 5.
Izvor Licanke survey 2021
With only one bailout bottle (again) I didn’t chance it. I wouldn’t have enough gas to make any meaningful progress and bail out if I needed to.
I took a compass bearing of the passage, counted my paces back to sump 4 and kitted up to dive back to a waiting Anton.
As I surfaced, excited to tell him the news, my BOV (bailout valve) started to free-flow and we had quite a job turning it off. I lost quite a lot of diluent gas and this was a concern as I still had two sumps to dive home.
As we were sorting out the problem, I felt something strange by my right hip. I reached behind to locate my line reel and found it had unclipped itself and rolled back down the slope, underwater.
With a lack of diluent I figured it would have to stay there, it was not worth diving back into the sump to find it.
Anton and I dived back through sump 3 and embarked on the painstaking carry back and forth to sump 2. Once all our gear was safely stashed, we unpacked the mini dry tube and began a grade 5 survey of the passage between sump 2 and sump 3. This was a relaxing affair and felt like a serious achievement to finally get this done and dusted.
It was finally time to dive home. I dispatched Anton into the sump first as there wasn’t much kitting up space for two people. As I turned on my rebreather, I realised I barely had 10 bar of diluent left. This was not good. Scratching my head, I worked out a way of plumbing in my bailout bottle to my rebreather and this worked remarkably well. The partial pressure of oxygen was easy to manage and it was a surprisingly comfortable dive home.
I surfaced to a very concerned team. Mark was particularly upset.
Anton did not know that I had needed to rectify a rebreather problem and of course, this took time. When he surfaced, he told the team I was a few minutes behind. In fact, I was an hour or so behind.
I had not even started kitting up when he’d left and the team were getting more and more concerned.
Anton did not have enough battery remaining on his scooter to come back looking for me easily, so they waited and waited, getting more and more worried as time passed.
They were pleased to see me, but much like when a child runs out into the road, you greet them with a bollocking.
Lou, doing her favourite thing
It was dark when we finally surfaced from sump 1. The guys had sorted pizza for us and beer. I was almost too tired to eat it.
We had been underground for 14 hours and underwater for 124 minutes. Sump 4 had been passed, new cave discovered and sump 5 was there, just waiting to be dived.
After a day off and an evening at our favourite ‘Bear’ restaurant, we headed back into the cave to recover all the equipment. Possibly due to familiarity or maybe just motivation to get the job done, the gear all came out in half the time it took to go in.
As usual, I was bringing up the rear and did a final ‘idiot check’ beyond sump one to make su
re all items had been taken out of the cave. I kitted up into my twinset to dive home.
“Where’s my hood?”
Vaguely remembering that I had packed a hood for safe keeping in a pot - which had doubtless headed out of the cave in someone’s bag - I looked dejectedly at the Santi woollen beanie that was lying on a slab of rock.
That would have to do.
I made a hasty exit from the 7 degree sump, wondering why I couldn’t have chosen a different hobby.
From left to right: Richard Walker, Christine Grosart, Mark Burkey, Louise McMahon, Anton Van Rosmalen, front: Fred Nunn.
I cannot thank the team enough for all their hard work and support on this project, members both past and present. Also, we must thank the staff and friends from Krnica dive centre; those who arranged permits to dive the cave, loaned us cylinders and sorted our gas.
We also wish to thank various diving and caving outfits who have assisted in some way, along the way:
We must also express our gratitude to the Ghar Parau Foundation for yet again giving us a grant and likewise, the Mount Everest Foundation for again selecting our project for an award.
We also wish to thank various diving and caving outfits who have assisted in some way, along the way:
Santi Diving; Halcyon Dive Systems; Suex Scooters; Fourth Element; Little Monkey Caving; Narkedat90
Dare to Tri
“There is not enough money in the world to persuade me to do that ever again!!”
These were not the words I had hoped to hear when one of my caving clients emerged from the regular haunt, Swildons Hole cave, high up on the Mendip Hills.
Usually people are tired, but exhilarated. I was surprised that an Olympic triathlete hadn’t taken to her first time caving as I’d hoped. Physically she had no issues at all, but mentally – the underground world just wasn’t for her.
Having previously spent many years at ungodly hours of the morning, up before the sparrows to present BBC breakfast from the red sofa, Louise Minchin was used to putting on a brave face and a front – even when things were going horribly wrong.
Nothing went wrong on this trip and we had a fantastic day – but nothing would encourage her to try it again.
My exploits in caving and cave diving had inspired her to include me in her new book, due out May 2023 – called:
‘Fearless’ – Adventures with Extraordinary Women.
I had no idea how she found me – but I’m so pleased she did.
Not so much that I had featured in her book, don’t get me wrong, which was super lovely – but I had met a GB triathlete…and my mind started whirring.
Louise Minchin tries her hand at caving
Newly single and in need of finding my real self again, plus my never-ending battle to be smaller, lighter and faster, I started to consider the idea that I might be able to do a triathlon.
I had always wanted to – after all, as my good friend and iron man veteran Darren Morley says;
“Why be shit at one sport when you can be shit at three?!”
Christine taking part in her first ever triathlon - and loved it!
The only thing that always held me back was the inability to ride a bike.
Over the last 18 months I had somewhat fixed that – so I had no more excuses really.
Then I read Louise's book; 'Dare to Tri' and I was hooked. I just had to do this!
Langport Triathlon 2022
Another friend suggested the Langport triathlon. A friendly, local event, the super sprint looked perfectly doable. Only 200m swim, 15km bike ride and a 3km run. How hard could it be?
Christine in her first triathlon
"It sounds crazy enough to be fun"
Sump 2 in Izvor Licanke is committing.
We worked out that if you go as fast as possible in the milky visibility on the scooter, you can just about pass it without having to undertake any decompression.
I scootered alone through the sump, my brain completely focussed on the thin, white line and keeping the speed up on the trigger and enough oxygen coming through my breathing loop.
Close to the end of the sump, as it started to ascend, I dropped off the scooters and made my way up the wall from 45m to the surface.
Surfacing in dry passage without somebody to chat too is both disappointing, but also relaxing.
The time is your own and you don’t have anyone else’s problems to concern yourself with.
I was impressed with the cave passage and made 3 journeys with my fins and suit bottle, then my rebreather, then my bailout bottle.
Hauling cylinders. Image: Mark Burkey
We renamed this piece of passage 'Helen's Highway' after our good friend and CDG treasurer of over a decade.
It was befitting of the whole team rather than one individual. After a cave diving and technical diving career of over 20 years, diving all over the world, to the shock of everybody, Helen took her own life at the start of the first Covid-19 lockdown in 2020.
Helen was one of those women I looked up to, wished I could be like and her generous, kind and very thoughtful nature was something I aspired to.
She once told me (when she sent me a Christmas present and I hadn't sent her one) "You don't give to receive". That was Helen all over. She didn't deserve to die that way.
It took me 20 minutes to get to sump 3 while carrying equipment and 15 minutes to go back to sump 2 empty handed.
I took it steady as I was wearing a drysuit and didn’t want to puncture it, but also moved methodically and efficiently. Being a caver of 26 years definitely has its advantages. You cannot be stumbling or uncoordinated beyond a sump.
I quite often chat to myself when I’m alone in a cave. Usually coming out with swear words and exclamations of incredulity when encountering something that is a nuisance.
Not far from where sump 2 surfaces, is an annoying boulder choke. Huge rocks balanced precariously and haphazardly atop one another block the passage. There is a convenient hole just the right size for me and a KISS rebreather to get through. I tried not to look too closely at the boulders - and tried even harder not to brush against the ones above me.
I trudged back and forth to a gravel ‘beach’ believing that the lake ahead was the start of sump 3.
Once all my gear was there, I started looking for the dive line. As I got down to water level, I realised this was not a sump at all, but in fact another lake.
Marvellous.
More swear words came out loud.
I moved my gear again, item at a time across the lake which was out of my depth and finally after a bit of rock-hopping, spied sump 3 and the line tied off properly above the waterline and well back on dry land. My ex-trainee had done good.
It was a comfortable kitting up spot and I was soon in the sump which only took 4 minutes to cross. I surfaced at the edge of a sloping ramp which led around a corner. I couldn’t see any further into the cave from the water, due to a huge rock flake obscuring my view. I knew that sump 4 was only a couple of metres further on and, given I did not have enough bailout with me to dive it, figured getting de-kitted was pointless.
Feeling a bit deflated, I set off home.
As I prepared to dive back through sump 2, I tested my 'go to' bailout bottle. This one stays with me at all times and the regulator is necklaced for easy access. I took a breath and got a complete mouthful of water. I checked the mouthpiece but it seemed intact.
Looking closer to try and decipher the problem, to my horror, the actual second stage body of the regulator itself had split. Clearly this regulator could not withstand a bit of caving.
This was completely unfixable. I was faced with diving home with only one bailout bottle and with no buddy, could not steal anyone else's.
I did not hang about on the way home and took a big sigh of relief when I reached the slightly shallower part of the cave, as I knew one bailout bottle would now get me at least to the decompression cylinders staged at the bottom of the shaft.
This trip was not one to be done solo and I vowed not to do it alone again. There were too many eggs in just one basket.
I surfaced to find a very chilly Mark and Lou waiting to greet me. They got me out of my equipment quickly and after some warm water with nothing else in it, we bagged up some items that needed to be taken out and plodded out of the cave.
Once I had something of a phone signal, I called my friend and cave diving buddy, Anton Van Rosmalen. The Dutchman was in the south of France and was wrapping up his own cave diving project in a super deep system called Coudouliére. This neighboured a system I and my team had been exploring and they were currently only 25 vertical metres away from each other…
Anton borrows Pedro Ballordi’s nail polish…
Anton had visited Licanke briefly in 2015 and not returned. This was his opportunity to see the entire cave for himself and do some exploration here.
He took an hour to think about it and line some things up, before he replied to say he was in.
He laughed down the phone “It sounds crazy enough to be fun!”
He had no idea…..
The good news for Anton was that, despite driving 14 hours to Fuzine and arriving in something of a ‘space cadet’ state, he had very little work to do. Ok, apart from completely rebuilding his rebreather and charging everything he owned, the good news was that all the scooters and bailout bottles were already in the cave.
All he had to do was dive... and cave... wearing his rebreather…
Luckily Anton dives the same unit as me, a manual KISS. He hadn’t arrived long when I was already eyeing him up as a spare part dispenser.
“I don’t suppose you’ve got a spare BOV have you?” I pondered.
“Of course”.
I knew he would have.
The front of mine had fallen off somewhere in the cave and I was worried about gravel ingress jamming it open. I put the spare in a pot ready to go into the cave.
We assisted Anton on getting his rebreather to sump 2 and did some housekeeping.
I re-lined and re-surveyed sump one and Fred, Lou and Mark set about finishing the dry cave survey between sumps 1 and 2 as the original data had been long lost. They did some bolting and photography and generally wrapped up the list of 'jobs' this project produces.
Rich continued convalescing and Anton headed back to the house to finish preparations.
The team decided to take an extra day off, knowing that the push dive would take a very long time. And it did...
This expedition has received generous assistance from several organisations and businesses listed below. We are grateful to our Croatian friends for their help and support over the last 6 years.
The expedition reports, funded by Mount Everest Foundation, are available to read here:
Funding and support:
Santi Drysuits, Halcyon Dive Systems, Mount Everest Foundation, Ghar Parau Foundation, Suex Scooters Warmbac
"We had all become distracted by the loss of a 5 grand scooter..."
Rich and I conducted the important but tiresome task of sorting cylinders to be filled, checking regulators, fixing regulators, dealing with fizzing pressure gauges and cracked o-rings and analysing each cylinder, before packing them into their own tackle bags for transportation through the cave.
This is all done in a relatively pleasant environment of Krnica dive centre and a dip in the sea afterwards is always welcome.
The team began to arrive at the airport and we loaded the rental van with Js of oxygen, trimix and air banks and Mark’s entire collection (almost) of camera gear.
We headed up to Fuzine and moved in.
Dry chamber between sumps 1 and 2. Image: Mark Burkey
The next morning we headed to the cave entrance. We had never been here in August and were shocked to see the water levels had dropped dramatically. Sump 1 was still a sump, but it added extra faff having to lower equipment down onto dry land rather than the convenient deep pool we had been used to.
Furthermore, inside the cave the normally flooded deep lakes which we scootered equipment across were now wading depth. This meant a prolonged carry with each of the 15+ bags, scooters, rebreathers and camera gear.
Another factor was that the low water levels exposed rocks that had never been trodden on, as they were usually underwater.
We weren’t long into the carry when Mark found one; carrying a heavy dry tube, he trod on a slab which I normally caught my knee on when scootering across the lake - and it snapped right under him.
I heard shouting and hurried back to the spot where Mark had ended up. His knee had shot down a slot after the rock had broken and twisted. After a quick assessment (good job I’m a Paramedic) I was happy to move him and after the initial shock, he felt better and had a good range of movement. His thick neoprene wetsuit had supported him enough to prevent any further damage and he wanted to carry on.
It was a stark reminder that we were thin on the ground for support and we couldn’t afford to lose a single person. Added to the extra time and effort involved with lower water levels, we knew this trip was going to be tough.
The carry was also interrupted by my nagging concern that I had only seen 2 scooters carried into the cave. I knew there were 3...
After some discussion, 2 divers were sent back to sump 1 to look for the missing Suex XK1. Somehow it had come free and was hiding in an alcove on the wrong side of sump 1.
Several hours later, as I headed back to the lakes to get another cylinder bag, I heard an almighty bang and loud voices. Then silence. Back at the climb, nobody was there so whatever it had been could not have been that bad….
It turned out that Rich had attempted the awkward climb up into the boulders and slipped, falling backwards whilst wearing his JJ rebreather; the huge slab of rock behind him bending the frame.
He was unhurt but we vowed that despite the climb being short, we should put in proper bolts to discourage people from free climbing it with only a hand-line - especially with thousands of pounds worth of heavy, expensive gear on their backs…
Rich pointed out that we had all become distracted by the loss of a 5 grand scooter and needed to concentrate. With such a small team, two of whom had never been in this cave before, the pressure was starting to show.
It seemed to take an age to get all the gear to sump 2 but it got there and we set Fred on the task of checking all the cylinders and regulators. A few had succumbed to the carry and we switched them out for new.
Setting up at sump 2. Image: Mark Burkey
It had been a long day and the team elected to take a day off the next day rather than launch straight into the push dive. This was a wise decision.
We spent our ‘day off’ brushing up on cave survey, knotting more line and sorting cameras.
The next morning, Rich and I got into our drysuits and the team got ready to see us to sump 2 and off into the unknown.
We had not even got as far as the boulder pile when again, I was called back. This time, Rich was in trouble.
He was coughing incessantly and complaining of exhaustion. He could barely put one foot in front of the other and he wasn’t even carrying anything. We feared the worst and sent him out of the cave.
Did he have covid?
I carried on to sump 2 whilst thinking on my feet about what to do. We were a man down and there was only one diver left capable of pushing the cave. It was all down to me. I’d have to do it alone...
Funding and support:
Santi Drysuits, Halcyon Dive Systems, Mount Everest Foundation, Ghar Parau Foundation,
A tall order
Caves remain the last frontiers on Earth that cannot be discovered unless you go there in person. Most of the easy pickings have long gone.
As the covid-19 saga rolled on into 2021, the likelihood of me being able to get to Croatia with a team to continue pushing the cave Izvor Licanke, looked gloomy.
As June approached, the travel restriction hokey-cokey continued and getting even the most enthusiastic divers to commit was proving impossible.
Travel through France was a no go and with a heavy heart, yet again I had to cancel the expedition.
Preparations had been stop start - how on earth do you plan an expedition when you don’t know who can come, when or even if it will take place and how you will ultimately get there.
Nothing was open, nothing was really working and, admitting defeat, I took a chance on August.
Figuring that holidays abroad and getting people moving would be good for somebody’s economy, I took the first of many risks, that partly by luck and partly by judgement, paid off.
For some reason August was rammed for most people so it was with a small team of 5 that we headed out to Croatia, with a tall order ahead of us.
My poor car!
The 2019 expedition had yielded a further 2 sumps beyond the deep sump 2 and the dive line ended some hundred or so metres into sump 4.
We had no idea if sump 4 would surface or plummet deeper. This is both the beauty and frustration of cave exploration - no human has ever been there; it cannot be photographed from space or planned by flying over it or studying it as you can with mountains. Even the world’s deepest ocean trenches have now been mapped.
Caves remain the last frontiers on Earth that cannot be discovered unless you go there in person. Most of the easy pickings have long gone.
We got lucky with Licanke in that access problems for the local cavers and cave divers globally had been lost for 20 years, but we managed with the help of locals, to gain legal access Licanke.
Thus, the end of the line laid by the French prolific cave explorer Frank Vasseur, was ready for the taking and with his permission (always ask, never just take) we began exploring the cave.
Since 2015 my team have now extended this cave by a further 1,229 metres, bringing the total length of the cave system to 1623 metres.
What we lacked in numbers in 2021 we made up for in talent. We are always fortunate to have a National Geographic and globally acclaimed underground photographer, Mark Burkey, on our team, He was taught to cave dive by my own fair hand and has let rip ever since, photographing beyond sumps all over the place in some really quite hard-to-reach places.
Louise McMahon. On the right.
Louise McMahon was new to the team and relatively new to cave diving, Highly intelligent and a fast learner, she brought various skills with her but most importantly, is a computer whizz and she offered to re-survey the cave system as far as sump 2 and produce a proper survey of the whole known cave.
Fred Nunn was a last-minute acquisition. I had taken him caving a few times and he took it all in his stride. He had thousands of dives under his belt, all of them in the sea, but it was not a difficult task to up-skill him in the cave diving skills he needed to cross the first short and shallow sump and he passed his course with flying colours.
Fred is often described as ‘Heath Robinson’ - a real problem solver. We hadn’t long invited him when he was already making lead flashing for the dry tubes and weighting systems of all sorts to tidy up our attempts and sinking unwieldy camera boxes and dry tubes.
The two push divers were myself and Rich as our chosen third partner was unable to get out of Mexico due to covid.
It was what it was. We knew it would be tough - and it was.
With thanks to Ghar Parau Foundation and the Mount Everest Foundation for supporting
this expedition.
With thanks to Santi Drysuits, Halcyon Dive Systems and Suex for their generous support throughout this expedition.
Hebridean Adventure, Part 4
…I heard screams coming from the shower cubicle opposite: “Muuuuuuummmm!!!!! It’s craaaawling!!! It’s got it’s tentacles out!!!!”
Eriskay & the Uists
Eriskay
The next day I jumped on a ferry across to Eriskay to stay on South Uist at a lovely little campsite called Kilbride. I chose the campsites owing to their proximity to good launch sites and sand beaches. This one didn’t disappoint. It had nice facilities, a really good café and a white sandy cove right there in the doorstep.
The first day the weather was a bit grey and rainy so I opted to ride. The road north of Kilbride towards North Uist, whilst it follows the coastline, you can’t actually see it so the ride was a tad dull but I managed a 39 mile round trip to the far side of the land bridge to North Uist and back.
The following day looked better for paddling though a bit overcast still. I headed north with the ebb tide and planned to ride the flood tide back which worked perfectly.
Long stretches of sandy beaches and glass calm waters accompanied me, along with huge seal colonies everywhere. Seals are such timewasters, I could spend ages just sitting still in my kayak watching them.
About 10 miles later, I spied a good lunch spot on a long, sandy stretch of beach which looked immaculate at first glance. I didn’t have to womble far from my landing spot to find scraps of litter and lost fishing gear everywhere. Then, I came across a half buried trawl net with a dead, decaying dolphin carcass right next to it.
I picked up as much small litter as I could and shoved it in the hold of my boat and set off back to Kilbride, damp, windswept and tired.
There was a teenage girl on the campsite who is scared of spiders.
I was on the loo this morning when I heard screams coming from the shower cubicle opposite: “Muuuuuuummmm!!!!! It’s craaaawling!!! It’s got it’s tentacles out!!!!”
Now, last time I looked the friendly daddy long legs in cubicle 2 doesn’t have tentacles...but anyway...
Next thing, we had screams coming from her tent as one had moved in for the night. She practically burst through the side wall of the tent like a hedge backwards to escape the deadly beast. The whole campsite was now trying to find - and remove - Mrs long legs to get a good nights sleep....
The next day I spent a while driving around the islands and enjoyed some sand in my toes and a brief paddle in the crystal clear waters of Eriskay while I waited for the ferry to come in.
I didn’t want to go home.
It had been such a stunning adventure, with a seemingly unlimited amount of freedom and the only thing that curbed it was ferry times - but even then, I managed to jump early ferries whenever I showed up and there was nothing too much trouble for the Calmac staff.
Eriskay
Living my best life.
To follow my adventure is photos, check out my Instagram page.
I highly recommend the following campsites and eateries if you are ever heading over the Outer Hebrides:
Wavecrest Campsite, Barra
Fidden Farm Camping, Mull
Kilbride Campsite
Dana Villa, Oban
Enjoy this final little AV which sums up my mini adventure in the Outer Hebrides. It was an absolute pleasure to visit and I hope it will not be too long before I can return...
Hebridean Adventure, Part 3
I was sure someone would find my body sliced in half through the glass door of the shower where I’d slipped on my eco-friendly conditioner bar…
Beautiful Barra
In the morning I headed back to Oban to grab the Barra ferry and rocked up at the very delightful Wavecrest campsite. Right on the beach, it promised good paddling but it was time for the bike again.
The campsite boasted showers so I treated myself - and couldn’t even get that right!
The £1 shower started as soon as the money dropped and I stupidly hadn’t even got undressed. In my haste, I plunged my hand into my wash bag and felt the blade of my eco razor slice off the top of my index finger.
Without even looking, I knew what I had done.
Crap.
Blood poured everywhere.
Determined not to waste my £1 coin - I only had one - I wrapped the sliced finger in loo roll and held it up above my head which slowed the bleeding a bit, whilst I tried to shower and wash my hair in the allotted time.
This is awkward anyway, but in my eco-friendliness I was using shampoo and conditioner bars which made things even harder, trying to get the lids off the pots and I kept dropping the bars. I was sure someone would find my body sliced in half through the glass door of the shower where I’d slipped on my eco-friendly conditioner bar.
What a way to go.
The shower stopped without warning at the conditioner phase - could have been worse - and I tried to get dressed without getting blood on any of my clothes, before mopping away the blood splats on the shower floor. FFS.
Back to the car, arm in the air, I single-handedly fished out my first aid kit which had enough to patch things up for the night.
Fortunately, a diver friend of mine who knew the area well, with the assistance of Facebook, pointed out the local A&E which I could visit on my bike ride the next day.
Epic shower fail
In the morning, having spent a relatively comfy night with my arm hooked over the headrests of my car, I re-patched my finger and set off round Barra for a stunning ride. As I headed north towards Barra airport, the sea became more turquoise and sparkly, the sun tried to come out and the sands got whiter and longer.
When I say airport, it is actually a sandy strip of beach and the tiny twin props were in and out all day.
I spied a good launch spot for my kayak and continued the ride around the island, stopping off in Castlebay to chat the the local (only) friendly paramedic in his ambo, before locating the A&E. The nurse was lovely and we had a good chin wag before she stuffed all sorts of fancy finger dressings in my bag and sent me on my way. 26 miles with only one evil hill.
News travels fast on Barra. By the time I got back to the campsite, the owner and his wife enquired as to if I was the lady paramedic who had sliced her finger off - and was there anything they could do. Bless them. I expect they felt terrible but I assured them it was all my own doing and I had cleared up the mess. They couldn’t have been nicer.
Castlebay
Despite being on the beach, the weather wasn’t ideal on the west side of the island the following day, so I drove my kayak up to the launching spot I had found and with a bit of effort, got myself and boat down to the beach. The tide was going out which made for a bit of shuffling to find deeper water. I was just getting afloat when a twin prop zoomed right over my head - right at the point I noticed a sign saying: “Stay off the beach when the wind sock is flying and the airport is active”. Oops.
I made a hasty exit across the bay and imagined the pilot shaking his fist at me.
Bloody tourists.
I had a cracking 11 mile paddle and the white sand made the colour of the water just unreal. It could have been Greece were it not for the 8 degree water temperature.
Hebridean Adventure Part 2
…but with two bottles of single malt and a bottle of gin on his back, he lost his balance and found himself upside down in a bramble bush!
Marvellous Mull
After a quick lunch stop at a castle on Karrera and playing 'dodge the Calmac ferry', it was time to take the short journey over to Mull to meet up with my old diving buddy Darren Morley who had been living there for some years.
He had been doing all sorts of triathlons and sportives and I knew he would be up for a decent bike ride.
I met up with Darren at the local Salen Spar shop where I came across the local moggy, who was very chatty and fiercely guards the community defibrillator!
The Salen Spar shop moggy.
After a pleasant evening camp, we set off around northern Mull for a decent 44 mile ride. There were some evil hills with hair pin bends that scuppered me but luckily they were only short. The clag was down but Darren took the time to point out all the islands I would have seen on a better day!
We stopped in Tobermory to load up on whiskey and goodies, me thinking that all the hills were done.
How wrong I was! Shocked at the next one I was faced with, Darren kindly took all my whiskey swag and rode it up the hill.
It was to be his undoing as, some while later, a large lorry ran us off the road. Darren was fine but with two bottles of single malt and a bottle of gin on his back, he lost his balance and found himself upside down in a bramble bush! I sort of fished him out and we made our way back to Salen.
No sooner had we got back and Darren was away to rescue a lady from a campsite. He is part of the local mountain rescue on Mull and regularly gets called to drag hapless tourists up beaches, off mountains and out of campsites to the waiting ambulance.
Meanwhile, I set off on the single track road for over an hour to Fidden Farm, right at the other, western end of Mull. This was mean to be a kayaking mecca. I turned up in grey mizzle but parked right at the edge of the white, sandy beach with turquoise, calm waters. It was idyllic.
The next morning I literally rolled out of my sleeping bag and into my kayak for a gentle mooch just south west of Fidden Farm. There were seals and birds a plenty and lovely white sandy beaches on desolate islands for snack stops.
After a couple of nights here, I headed back to the mainland as I couldn’t get a ferry direct from Mull to Barra, my next stop.
On the advice of my good friend Dave Ryall, I found a nice little overnight top right on the shore of Loch Etive. The weather was ok, so I couldn’t resist a little paddle up the loch which was like glass; not a ripple. Then I heard a big splash behind me. I was being tracked by a couple of seals who no doubt hang out there in the hope of an easy meal from the fish farm in the loch.
After an evening of tinned camping food and some wine, I settled in for the night ready for the ferry crossing the next day to Barra.
Whisky stop at Tobermory
Hebridean Adventure, Part 1
I did a lap of the island Kerrera which was about 13 miles and I hadn’t been on the water long before I was surrounded by seals!
It’s pretty shameful that, for someone who loves the great outdoors, I’ve been travelling to Scotland and back home again since 2017 without setting foot outside the hotels, harbours and airports.
Covid-19 forced many of us from the south west to ditch the 1 hour flight and take on the long haul to Aberdeen by road.
During one, long stint at sea I made an impulsive ebay purchase of two sea kayaks. Plus some blades and spray decks - and some roof bars…
The last part of mainland Scotland before catching the ferry
You see, my kayak marathon days were long over. In 2009, whilst training for a sub 24 hour Devizes Westminster race over 125 miles, I wrecked my lower back and had two bulging discs in my spine. It almost cost me my career and halted a lot of heavy physical exercise for almost a decade. Cave diving apart, of course…
So, I sold all of my racing boats and never got into a kayak again apart from the odd splash on holiday.
I’d been losing a tonne of weight and doing lots of cycling and my back was holding up. I took the plunge and spent weeks offshore planning my next adventure.
I had hoped a friend could join me but her van wasn’t ready. My car-come-camper Agnetha the spacetourer was all kitted out and ready to go. I set off to the outer Hebrides with promises of white sandy beaches, crystal clear waters and seals and basking sharks a plenty.
If Covid-19 has taught us anything it is that life is too short - and we only get one go at it. I decided not to waste a moment and headed down to Somerset, picked up my kayak and the mountain of Amazon purchases to go with it, did a quick cycling sportive (Great Weston Ride) and drove straight back up to Scotland.
To the amusement of my work colleagues, I had quite an itinerary! It was necessary to maximise how much I could see and do and juggle the ferry times and crossings.
My first stop was Oban where I stayed in a lovely B&B called Dana Villa and I found a great little place, Puffin divers, who not only let me park by the waters edge and launch my boat but took a lot of time and good humour to recommend a good paddle.
I did a lap of the island Kerrera which was about 13 miles and I hadn’t been on the water long before I was surrounded by seals!
I just about had enough time to finish my paddle, get the kayak back on the roof and head down to Oban to catch the evening ferry to Mull.