We met Elliott and Michael near the entrance pitch and left them to de-rig this as we headed out. Rob left before Martin and I, dissappearing down the hill rather quickly. We were a bit slower, weighted down with lots of gear. And after today all of Balcony was finally derigged and the derig was completed for this year.
++It was decided that this year, the CUCC expo would establish an underground camp in Kraken Chamber, +Tunnocksschacht, as pushing trips to the lower leads were getting to be around 18 hours, which was bordering on +the unsafe in terms of fatigue in combination with navigating the nylon highway required to get in and out. +
+Having arrived late at expo, I was to be on the last pushing trip of the season, after which we'd start to +derig. The plan had been to spend two nights underground, but heavy rain and flooding pitches meant we postponed +our start and would only spend one night down there. This would be by far the deepest I had ever been - my +previous record was a mere -280m, while the campsite here was at -600m, with the pushing front a further -300m +below that. I am also not a huge fan of massive pitches, so after spending the morning trying to think of ways I +could get out of the trip entirely, I made somewhat slow progress down the cave as I tried not to cry or have a +panic attack. Very much type 2 fun at this point. I really felt like I had reached the edge of my comfort zone +at -500m, but of course there were many more metres to go... at least I had avoided getting strung up on the +knot passes. Some noodles upon reaching the campsite briefly restored spirits before we descended further into +the bowels of the earth. +
+I became significantly happier upon reaching Song of the Earth, a massive steeply ramping railway tunnel of a +borehole discovered only a week or two previously. This was mainly because I was not dangling precariously on a +small bit of string. At this point we split into two teams: Katey and myself were to go on down and look at what +we thought was the deepest part of the cave so far, while Peachey wanted to do a bit of bolt climbing, so Fleur +agreed to belay him. Katie and I slithered for what seemed like miles across the muddy boulders and eventually +reached the previous limit of exploration, just on the far side of a sandy dig called "Don't Stop Me Now". We'd +been informed by the previous team that this had carried "a howling gale" - the gentle breeze wasn't quite what +we expected, but it was blowing nonetheless - maybe the lower water levels had something to do with it. We +whipped out the survey book and instruments and off we set, getting in two really great legs... before turning a +corner... to find a climb of around 6m with no footholds and carrying a small stream. Katey volunteered to have +a look up there and reported back that it was very muddy and slippery. We decided that we would really need to +bolt this to make it safe - a small slip at this depth could have very serious consequences, but sadly, we'd not +been expecting to need bolting kit and the expedition was running out of rope anyway, so we shot a final survey +leg before reluctantly turning around. +
+We went to find Fleur and Peachey, who were on the far side of what Fleur described as "proper fucking horrible +bouldery death". There was a mysteriously fresh dead bat. Got a bit chilly waiting around, then headed back up +to camp for dinner and the newly invented camp cocktail, custard tea, before a nip of Kraken rum restored +feeling to my toes and I jumped into the welcoming embrace of the world's largest sleeping bag. +
+The next morning we broke camp, but decided to leave a lot of kit there as there were still some very plausible +leads for next year. I headed out first with a couple of tackle bags, including the giant sleeping bag (it had +done a sterling job of keeping me alive in the 0C cave...) while the others derigged a lot of the rope with the +PAELLA technique (Pulling An Extremely Long Length Alltogether, I think) ready for removal by hauling teams the +next day. Katey and Peachey stayed back to do even more derigging while Fleur caught me up, then we headed back +to the Top Camp bivi for some curry, which was the best meal of my life up to that point. +
+This trip (with many words of encouragement from Fleur in particular) showed me that I am actually capable of a +lot more than I think I am, and though I'm a long way from being as fluid and quick as the others on ropes, I +think I've moved past some mental barriers there. Right now I don't feel like I want to rush straight back to +the camp, but give it time - I'm sure that by next summer I'll be ready to break my Bottom Inspector record once +again. + +