Health and Safety

Thinking back to France again, on our brief walking break, I was impressed by the lack of health & safety provisions which typically blight interesting locations in Britain. There were no warning signs over sheer drops, crumbling fortifications were unmended, railways unfenced: overall there seemed to be a general concensus that it's an individual's responsibility to act sensibly and to take care.


(Moonface and the Cow's Arsehole)


A case in point was the cave near Meailles. In the Mendips there are many limestone caves and potholes, all of which are carefully closed off by locked steel shutters to prevent the unwary or inquisitive from entering them. Two hours walk into the hills from Meailles, it's a different story. The Grotte de Meailles is 400m long, and descends for over 100 slippery muddy metres into the hillside. And it's completely open to anyone, so Moonface and I investigated it. Locally, it's known as the "Cul de Boeuf". It was a great experience, descending steeply along the sticky clayey boulders inside the cavern. We had two torches, so light wasn't a problem, but there were potholes in the floor of the grotte which we had to look out for. It's the first proper cave I've been in unaccompanied and without guides, since I went into Kirkdale cave as a lad. It was cool, it was sticky, it was wonderful. I only wish that we had spent more time there, but we had a last train to catch from Meailles back to Entrevaux. We saw no other walkers that day, only a solitary woman mushroom-picker in the morning.



:o)