TWO cavers with an adventurous streak are hoping to go boldly where no man has gone before when they set off to explore unknown underground territory tomorrow, Saturday.

Alister Renton and Jon Riley, who both live in Kendal, are travelling to the Guangxi Province in south east China to discover new cave systems.

Both members of Yorkshire Ramblers, they are taking part in a three-week trip, which will involve using white water methods to forge a route along underground rivers and canyons.

Alister Renton, 24, who lives with his parents Chris and Joyce at Helsington Laithes, will be acting as communications expert in the 16-man team, which includes experts from Tasmania and France, as well as England.

"It's a bit like discovering a new island.

The purpose of the trip is to go out there and see what we can find and bring back survey data.

We are hoping to find something big, new cave systems," he said.

"There are risks involved because there are no rescue vehicles standing nearby and if somebody gets stuck we've got to get them out ourselves and medical care is a long way away."

Alister, who works for Virtual Access, an electronics company in Skipton, will be linking cavers up with experts on the surface to count the miles of tunnels electronically using a laptop computer.

Explorers also hope to discover new species of cave fauna and are being assisted by Chinese universities during the trip to an exotic area where the mountains and hills are carved into spectacular scenery.

"In China they don't have that many local cavers in that region, it's not such a national sport so there is lots of potential for finding new caves that people have never been to before," said Alister, who is looking forward to the challenge on his first trip abroad with the team.

Ged Campion, of Wolverhampton, who is leading the expedition, said the team had a track record of discovering caves.

"In the winter of 1998, jointly with the French, our team broke the world depth record in the Mirolda cave in mountains in the shadow of Mont Blanc," he said.

"This time our goal will be to try to find 20 kilometres of cave passage which is beautifully decorated, but not without significant challenges and risks."