Deeper underground

As I made my way down the M6 towards Bristol this weekend for a reunion, I would not have been able to foresee what Gadsby had in store for us - his 'friends'.

It started off well enough, with the exception of Aalok being foolish and arriving late per usual. The journey south was 3hrs 15mins, which was a lot quicker than I expected. Perhaps the guys who look after the M6, M5 and M4 deserve some praise. Friday night was fine, Nilo even made the gathering and the four of us caught up, as Andy's new wife made startling discoveries about us and his past.

On the Saturday we awoke early for our adventure. If you've ever done caving before you'll know its about going underground in pitch blackness, depending on a small head lamp for light, crawling, writhing and wriggling through rock, stones and puddle, trying your very best to stay standing where the caves allow you to, and trying to move forward where the heights don't allow you to even crawl. It's a truly remarkable experience.

If you've not done this before I'd try and avoid a film called The Descent! It was hard work, and I don't mind the bruises and aches so much, but I wouldn't recommend it to you claustrophobes or achluophobes. You should have seen Kanwar, he couldn't quite believe his luck!


After getting cleaned up we spent some time recovering and then prepared for world domination. I must admit, I've actually been playing Risk quite frequently of late, with newly found players up here in Manc. But this legendary version of Capital Risk is quite something. Obviously, I won, but Aalok did try his utmost to stop me. Unlucky boys, better luck next time.

On the Sunday, I'd already planned to visit my sister in Bath and popped over in the afternoon and lunched at Nandos! It was good to catch up and check out her hood down there. As a surprise I also popped into my friend from uni, Tim. I didn't expect him to be living a couple of roads down from my sister but it was fun reminiscing. Overall, I had a tiring, but great weekend.