South Ribble Beaver Scouts go Caving

On a bright but breezy Saturday morning, forty four excited Beaver Scouts and their leaders set off from Leyland bound for the White Scar Visitor caves at Ingleton.  Once there we donned safety helmets and were taken in to the cave to learn about stalactites and stalagmites and underground ‘carrots’.  We had to squeeze through some narrow spaces but the most exciting part was when they turned the lights off.

On leaving White Scar, we met up with the members of the county caving team at Ribble Head.  We had a hasty picnic then split into two groups to prepare for the really exciting part of the day.  One group stayed behind to play wide games whist the other split into even smaller groups and got ready for their first taste of a real cave. Everyone who was going in the cave had to put on a fleecy ‘Andy Pandy’ suit then a strong caving suit on top.  This time the helmets had lamps fastened to them as it would be very, very dark inside the cave. We had to walk across a couple of fields to reach the entrance to the first cave.  Each group of four Beaver Scouts was accompanied by one of their own leaders and two members of the county caving team who made the trip many times in the course of the afternoon. Despite the butterflies in some tummies, every Beaver Scout made it through at least one of the small caves and emerged triumphantly at the other side.  ‘Brilliant!’ Wicked!’ ‘Awesome!’ ‘Can we come again next week?’ Were some of the comments from the Beaver Scouts.  This was a first time experience for most of the leaders who were equally euphoric with their achievement in conquering their fears. Once everyone had been through the caves and having struggled out of our caving suits and changed our wet socks, we headed back to the bus for the journey home.

Marion Yardley

ADC Beaver Scouts

South Ribble District