Wapping Mine - Alan Brentnall
Last night's trip was the annual "Xmas Party" caving trip, and, this year, we chose to visit Wapping Mine. This festive trip involves bringing, sharing and eating seasonal food, so it is always very popular. Indeed, last night we had no less than fifteen cavers out - Steve, Luke, Jess, Alex, Alan, Chris, Katie, Cat, Gaz, Rob, John, Bernie, Pete, Julian and myself. And a hell of a lot of food.
We parked on the lane up the side of the New Bath hotel, where the local gardener had been burning some brushwood, and had kindly left us a toasty pile of glowing embers to get changed by. It was warm and pleasant chatting by the fire while waiting for folk to arrive and get ready; in fact, it was quite difficult moving away from the warmth to go caving!!
But this year's venue, Wapping Mine, really is a warm cave, and we were soon over "Colum's Wall" and into the Main Stope, marching towards Funnel Chamber. Our first destination was Selenite Chamber, and Steve had clearly been doing his homework, as he led us easily through the Wapping Maze to the South Stope, where the little scramble up to the chamber goes off left. Selenite Chamber is a pretty place with walls decorated with white selenite, a form of gypsum which is often used to write messages on in Wapping. Here we had a brief sit and chat, discussing a recent callout to Titan among other things.
Next we tried to find the base of the climb up to the Devil's Pit in Cumberland Cavern. This taxed our orienteering skills a little, with a circular route bringing us straight back to the South Stope. But, eventually, Pete worked out the correct way and soon we were all climbing up into Chamber Three of Cumberland Cavern.
From there we found our way through to the Trog's Chamber, where we aimed to have our party. And what a feast it was! Pies, pigs-in-blankets, all sorts of cheese, crisps, twiglets and other savouries were followed by lebkuchen (German gingerbread), Christmas pud and custard, chocolate Rudolf cake and after-8s - all washed down with mulled wine, mulled apple juice and ginger ale. It's a good job we didn't choose to have the party in Sidetrack, or we would all still be in there!
After feasting and clearing everything up, we made our way back to Funnel Chamber, studying the old graffiti on the way, and from there it was an easy stroll to the walled exit. And so ended a pleasant and convivial caving trip, marking an end to a good year's set of midweek caving trips.
Wapping Mine and Cumberland Cavern together make a huge, interesting underground venue in Matlock Bath. It's a great place to visit; much of the caving is relatively easy, although, like all abandoned mines, there are risks. Back at the start of the century, Dave Webb and John Barnatt wrote a great guide to the place, describing the layout (with surveys and pictures) and its uses as a mine and a tourist attraction (Cumberland Cavern was a showcave) over the years. You can still buy the book from the DCA for £11.00 (+90p postage) or you can download it from: