Caving in Weardale - Jacob's Well

As well as being a roundabout in the middle of Bradford, jacob’s Well is a small limestone cave in Frosterley in Weardale. I thought I’d mention that first.
Nenthead Brian told me about this event a couple of weeks ago and booked places for me, him and Charlie the ceramicist and Pieblog follower.
The purpose of the event was (I think) to introduce people to Carboniferous Limestone caves as part of the annual Northern Rocks festival of Geologically based public events. As it happens, only one of the five punters who turned up weren’t “underground” people (should we call them “The Trogs?”), which meant that our guide could, to some extent, allow us a little more freedom than he’d first planned for.
Northern Rocks is held every year and is a programme of walks and events with a Northern Pennines Geological theme – which means Carboniferous with a dolerite intrusion here and there and lots of valuable minerals and industrial archaeology….
Its part of the AONB and the European Geopark stuff….
Any road up, it was held at Harehope Quarry at Frosterley, which is run by volunteers as an educational centre for geology, mainly for children. It’s a very worthy thing . they also have free-range chickens (I bought some eggs, laid earlier today…
Our event was to explore a little cave in a semi-natural gorge at the eastern end of the quarry. The cave has been mapped and named by schoolkids , including the naming of the various features inside – eg The Crack of Doom – a large fissure in the floor – and so on. Anybody familiar with the Bridge of Death in Glen Feshie will appreciate that “The Crack of Doom really should be uttered in a mad-professor/comedy horror film squeaky voice…. Others won’t have a clue as to what I’m on about here…
Also – in the gorge, there’s a large area of Frosterley marble. This contains a substantial number of coral fossils and for those who don’t like dark holes in the ground – a good place to see this rock is in the Chapel of the Nine Altars and St Cuthbert’s shrine in Durham cathedral. The theory is that this is, in fact, the very spot where those pillars were quarried – I believe, some 800 years ago.
And so, after trampling all over this valuable stone, we entered the cave and walked and crawled and got muddy. At one point, the main passage has been walled off by a thick wall of brick encased in stone and what appears to be Victorian concrete. At the foot of the wall, a small, round mouse-hole of a hole has been punched through and three of us braved the extreme squeeze to get through to the other side.
And back again.
All good dirty fun.
After coffee and cakes, me, Brian and Charley repaired tp the Hare and Hounds at Westgate to have a short interval of light boozing and taking the piss out of the politicians on the telly post some kind of election they’ve apparently been having (As we’ve not had any local politicians who could be arsed doing any campaigning, safe in the knowledge that their personal fortunes will be safer if nobody was actually aware of their existence, I’m just assuming that an election was taking place. If there were any local candidates, they didn’t make themselves known or if, indeed they had any policies other than establishing large personal pension plans. As they couldn’t be arsed with their bit of electioneering, so could I not be arsed voting for any of them. Whoever they are. It doesn’t really matter anyway, cos they all have the same basic philosophy which concerns attempting to increase happiness by the promotion of the acquisition of new electrical equipment and other white goods. Nothing to do with warmth or compassion or any of that rubbish. There’s no money to be made from that.

Sorry… distracted rant there…..

Anyway, Jacob’s Well Hole is a fun hole to crawl through. We’ll probably go back, I shouldn’t wonder.

Armistice with BT

I got a phone call from India this morning and a pleasant lass (with whom it would be impossible to have a rant 'cos she'd just sympathise till you'd stopped) told me that the email I got was an automaed one and I wouldn't be getting new wires and plugs and software and passwords and phone numbers and that all I needed to do was oay£2 a month less than previously and would it be OK to say that the issue was resolved. I agreed.

I've told the wife as it's she who pays the bill!!!! (bet that took you by surprise) So the war is over before it started. (unless I get a package....)

BT's occupation of the ex-British Empire was confirmed by a second phone call from a lass with, apparently, a South African accent. She didn;t know about the other call. I told it was all right now and that it was resolved.

The remaining mystery was , what was in the undelivered envelope with money to pay?

Rachel - You didn't put a big enough stamp on yer mum's birthday card, yer naughty girl...

I am now searching for another utility company to have a rant at. The Gas people seem to be a fair target. Or maybe the Council. I'll not have a bad word said about BT's customer complaints departmeent. (their auto emails and "contact us" phone number systems are rubbish, though)

Pic shows foamy boots for no good reason at all. Never put washing up liquid in your boots before having a paddle.

Dales Way with Phreerunner and Cosh Knott

I decided to see if I could find Martin Banfield today. Martin aka Phreerunner (from the Postcard from Timperley blog) is walking from Windermere to as near to Manchester as he can get in the time allotted and, today, was supposed to be at Ribblehead at 10:30 am.

So, despite the Richmond lollipop girls, the Richmond rush hour, the Leyburn tractorfest and the Hawes “Lets all park in the one way system whilst we go shopping” club, I arrived early to find Martin stomping past Gearstones in a feeble attempt to avoid company. It wasn’t to be, though – so me and superdawg joined him and together we all trotted off up the Dales Way in walking conditions that were close to perfect – not too hot, quite sunny, good, clear views, no contact with British telecom who apparently tried to phone me a couple of times but failed, and also tried to have their bits of equipment and software delivered, but couldn’t because they didn’t put enough stamps on the envelope (dhuhhh!!) And they want me to pay the difference…. Hah!…. sorry – ranting again…

Anyway, we did notice that there were no butterwort around but quite a lot of tormentil and that Cam Houses doesn’t have a tea room. Martin seems to be enjoying his walk, though, and, for those following his progress, it doesn’t seem too much of an effort for him at all…

We lunched at Beckermonds and Bruno demonstrated his tin cleaning skills on Martin’s tin of smoked tuna (He had managed to eat the tuna before Bruno got involved). And here, we parted. Martin went off to the fleshpots of Hubberholme and I climbed up onto the ridge to the South and followed the wall to Cosh Knott. Loads of wild flowers up here – and a cracking view of Penyghent. I think Bruno was feeling a bit knackered here, so we stopped for a while and had a second lunch. I let the dog watch me scoff the last cheese butty. It seemed to perk him up a bit.
And so, we continued – down to the Pennine Way, which we followed past Birkwith Farm and Calf Holes Pot and up to the junction with the Dales Way and back to the car.

16 miles and 2400 feet of uphill for me. And a pint of brown stuff at the Victoria Inn somewhere near Hawes….

Oh no....

Whilst in the middle of a bit of lightweight surfing yesterday, I got a sales call from somebody whom I assumed to be from BT, telling me that I could save two quid a month on my BT bill if I renewed the broadband contract.

I usually take the piss out of cold callers on the phone, but this time, for some inexplicable reason that I sort of thought I might live to regret, I said "yes".

I just got an email from BT, telling me that my order would be delivered tommorrow and that I would get lots of shiny new kit, a new broadband phone number and a new password.

This is the very last thing I want. The thing barely works now. If I start buggerring about with it, its not going to work at all.

I tried to cancel. First I tried ringing the phone number. After a lot of wandering around the algorithm, I was finally told(by a recording) that a third party had raised the order for me and to contact them. What? Not BT? I have no idea who it was.... they didn't say who they were... neither did they mention new passwords, phone numbers, routers, cables....

I filled in the form which says "I have a complaint" and I also replied to the email about the order saying that I didn't want it any more. I'm not very confident that either of these will have any effect at all.

The phone line has fallen over three times whilst I type this... no, make that four. Its so delicate, I dare not touch it.

I'd forgotten just how crap BT are at dealing with customers. After my mother died, I rang to tell them. A few days later, they wrote to her regretting that she'd left BT and if would she consider rejoining.... I rang them again. Eventually, I managed to get a human being, somewhere on the other side of the Empire. She failed to understand. I gave up. They wrote to her again. I complained. Nothing happened. Its been eleven months now and not a dickie bird out of BT

So, I am not optimistic. This has all the makings of a disaster as far as my computer/internet thingy is concerned.

I'm going for a walk tommorrow.

Another pic of the Tyne Gorge jaunt. I'll probably be blogging from the library shortly....

Never buy things on the phone...never buy things on the phone....never buy things on the phone...

..fallen over six times....

More Howgills stuff

...is now appearing at http://www.doodlecat.com/howgills/10jun.html . This, of course, is the June entry in the diary, rather bizarrishley written in October 2006. There's just another two months of this stuff to go. Many people..er some people..er. somebody ... will be wondering exactly what the point of all of this is. This is the one where we introduce a bit of uncertainty and tension and stuff...

So, there you are.