Expo 2007
2007-07-07
Anthony Day,
Anthony's journey out
Those who know their expo lore will be aware of the fun and games I
endured whilst attempting to tow a decrepit trailer across Europe in
1995. Since then I've been pouring money into various European breakdown
schemes without further incident - so I was about due for a return on my
investment. Somewhere north of Hamburg I noticed that my bonnet seemed
to be flapping around quite a lot. Having established that it was
actually shut, I ignored the problem for 5 hours until it had clearly
got worse. It turns out that the corrosion on the bit of bonnet that the
catch was attached to had got so bad that it was in danger of completely
unattaching itself - in which case the bonnet could spring open. At this
point, I decided to make use of my breakdown cover. To make this a trad.
style breakdown I didn't have a mobile with me, so I spent a nostalgic 2
hours sitting in a Gasthof - completely unaware of what (if anything)
was happening reminiscing about similar experience at the side of
various European motorways all those years ago. Eventually the mechanic
turned up, laughed at the state of my bonnet, bolted it together through
the remaining bits of good metal and gaffered it shut. Overall I was
only delayed by about 2.5 hours, and made it to Austria without further
incident.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-10
Nial Peters, Edvin Deadman, Kathryn Hopkins, Ollie Stevens, Richard Mundy,
204 - Rigging Entrance to 204-E
Nial put some extra bolts (3) into the entrance pitch then showed us
some of the high level horizontal stuff and the top of the main Gaffered
pitch.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-10
Djuke,
Top Camp - Djuke's Bedtime Story
Snow greeted us on a snowy cold, misty damp bivy morning. Most of us
(except Aaron - who kept emphasising how great his sleeping bag was) had
spent the night shivering away and Nial in his £20 Argos sleeping bag
was up at 6.30am preparing the stove and everyone slowly emerged. As was
I, unfortunately discovered (after mustering all the courage in me - and
counter my instinct - crawling out of my sleeping bag) that I didn't
have my furry. Great! :( had left it at base camp in the tent where I'd
used it as a pillow. So Aaron and I spent a cold day taking turns
rigging the tarps (intermittently taking turns to rewarm our fingers). I
was soooo annoyed not to be caving and having to spend my time in
the cold bivy - am glad to be back at basecamp - am glad to be back at
basecamp in warm hut after having shower :)
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-10
Julia Bradshaw,
Base Camp - Germknodel
Makes 8 large/12 small or 4 superlarge plate sized
500g flour
1 packet germ/heffe - yeast
125g butter
100g sugar
3 eggs
Jam: powidl (damson)
poppy seeds
icing/caster sugar
Combine butter + sugar + eggs in pan - heat, with care to avoid
making an omelette (in Aaron style!) In a separate bowl put the flour
and yeast. Once the butter etc has melted pour the flour/yeast mixture
into it, take off heat and mix until no lumps remain. Put in a warm
place to rise for 1hr. Divide into the number of required portions,
shape into circles, and form a dip in the middle of each. Then put a max
of a tablespoon of jam into the dough circle, and fold the edges over to
cover the hole.
Put the finished knoedel into a warm place for 1hr ish then steam -
super large for about 40mins-1hr, large/small for 20 mins (using
colander over pan of water). Pour melted butter over then icing sugar
and poppy seeds.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-11
Mark Dougherty, Anthony Day,
115 - MarkD & Anthony install a radon detector in 115
Tramped along the Stogerweg armed with a GPS location for 115.
Neither of us had been there before, but I recalled seeing a marking
showing the way to the cave from the main 204 path. This we duly found
and wandered off in the direction of the arrow. Spotted a small entrance
which we (erroneously) took as a sign that we were very close to the
main entrance. Spent 30 mins thrashing around in bunde and teetering
down cliffs whilst the distance to the cave remained stuck at around 30m
according to the GPS. We suspected we were too high, and eventually got
low enough down that we could see the entrance.
Went in for about 5 mins, through a crawl which enlarges to a small
chamber before a climb down. The radon detector is hung in an alcove on
the right (on the way in) in this chamber to keep it out of the
(considerable) draught. Satisfied with our day's work, we headed off to
the Loserhütte for a jar.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-11
Julia Bradshaw,
Journey to Austria - Julia's journey out
After quite a few trains and 6 days cycling in Italy I ended up in
Venice. Pottered around for a day and a half, then got a sleeper train.
Only covering was a sheet, which meant sleeping on the actual bed
without anything separating you from the carpet-like covering on the
bed. Very comfortable and cooling ... Got up at 5am to be greeted by the
guard bearing my breakfast tray (only two Semmel and a cuppa but still -
service!). Train from Attnang Puchheim to Bad Aussee, where Dour was
waiting next to a Citroen van which was looking significantly more
battered than a week ago ...
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-12
Djuke Veldhuis, Nial Peters, Edvin Deadman, Kathryn Hopkins, Ollie Stevens,
Top Camp - It's raining - again
It's raining... AGAIN! We are about to walk up the hill
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-12
Jenny Black, Olly Betts,
Top Camp - Setting up 76 bivi
We left a bag of stuff stored at the bivi cave, most of it survived
intact. A mouse appeared to have had a nibble at the food box but
failed to get through the gaffer tape, let alone open the lid. It also
nibbled the Tunnocks that we accidentally left. We left a tent and lilo
in a drybag. The elastic in the tent poles is no longer very stretchy,
presumably due to the cold?
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-13
Jenny Black, Olly Betts,
97 - Prospecting Beyond 97
We went looking for a 'back door' into 97. Olly found a promising
looking shaft (2007-70) which he descended. 2007-70 is located on a
slight rise on the edge of a stretch of pavement just beyond 97. The
entrance is a approximately 1.5m diameter shaft with a horizontal
connection to an adjacent (larger) shaft a few metres down. At the
base, an icy snow slope drops away before the roof comes down - possibly
passable with less ice/snow. Above this end, and ice fall comes in from
a small passage up which I couldn't easily get to. The larger adjacent
shaft doesn't have any leads. While walking back Olly noticed a low
entrance (2007-71) in a slope. We took it in turns moving rocks out of
the way, and Olly went in. It drafts out a fair amount, though not as
much as Draft Bitter. I went back to the bivy (twice because I was
forgettful in my excitement at finding a new cave) to get my caving gear
and we went underground.
After the low wriggly start it improved to walking/stooping/crawling
passage. There is a currently undescended pitch early on the right,
another at the current end, and a yet to be explored side passage. I
have high hopes that it will be a significant cave in its own right, or
else connect with 97 or 76...
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-13
Anthony Day, Mark Dougherty, Andreas Forsberg,
204 - Kiwi Suit Rig
Set off at 3pm following the first wave who had gone in to rig as far
as the bottom of Ariston. Met James C in Wolpertinger Way, he was
heading out because he was cold, and caught up with the others at the
head of Steel Toe Cap. Mark D rigged the last Ariston pitch, I rigged
the first Kiwi Suit pitch, then wibbled on the start of the traverse to
the second for long enough that Mark D took over again - pausing only to
spit in a pot at the head of the fourth Kiwi Suit pitch, i.e. the Brown
Trouser Pitch head. Mission accomplished we headed out.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-13
Richard Mundy, Ollie Stevens, Dave Loeffler,
204 - Rhino Rift
Dave introduced us novices to exploration in Rhino Rift. This began
by exploring a few QM's, giving dull outcomes. 03-57C became too tight
after 3 metres, 03-60C looped back into the passage (with a dead hole in
the roof), and 03-70A connected to Grater. We then ventured into the
seemingly maze-like Piccadilly Junction and tried 03-66B. This led on
in a fairly tight phreatic manner, cutting back under itself and
twisting into a more rifty character, before coming across a steep
slope. This was all surveyed in record time thanks to Dr Phil
Underwood's wonderful Shetland Attack Pony - a loveable device apart
from its eyeburning laser. This "Shanks Pony Passage" led to "Shetland
Incline", at which point Dave grew increasingly excited, rigging in an
increasingly swift and worrying manner. We found a muddy rift passage to
the right descending this pitch, complete with footprints! Holes in the
floor prevented further access, but Dave suspected this to be a link
with "Uncomformity" ...
We then decided to get out, but found ourselves to be racing against
a 22.00hr call out. Dave and I cut a deal whereby he carried the tackle
sack along the passage and I pulled it up the pitches. The 204e
entrance pitch at 21.50 thus left me a sweaty blob. We got back to the
Stone Bridge at 21.59 after an 11 hour trip!
Leads uncovered by the trip included C at the bottom of pitch
descended by Dave and an aven in the roof. This was at the bottom left,
looking down the sloping pitch. At the head of this sloping pitch was a
B lead similar leads existed on the right and at the bottom. A C lead
existed from the muddy footsteps passage.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-13
Nial Peters, Djuke Veldhuis,
204 - Rigging Gaffered
The plan was to rig to the underworld in one trip, so with over 300m
of rope between us (200m of 11mm in Big Bertha - which was a mistake!)
we set off. The rigging went quite fast and several improvements over
the old rig were found. However, we had accidentally left all the spits
and cones on the surface. When we reached Trihang and decided it needed
a new bolt therefore, we had no option but to turn back. The return trip
was much easier given we no longer had any rope to carry! The round trip
was 7.5hrs at an easy pace.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-14
Jenny Black, Olly Betts,
148 - Marylin Monroe Hoehle
Went back to look at 148, 20 years after it was last explored.
Crawling entrance to a squeeze and climb into a larger passage, so far
the same as the old description and similar to the old survey if you
rotate it by about 56 degrees. Then at the junction right doesn't
actually choke - there is a way on doubling back that ends at a diggable
sandy crawl. Left at the previous junction was missing the snow from
1987 and led to a pitch which you could reach either approximately 10m
from the bottom of 20m up. Daylight just about comes in from above along
with lots of drips presumably a snow plug on the surface above a big
pitch very close to the 204 path.
I got really cold cos it drafted a lot and I was only wearing one lot
of thermals under my furry. At the base of the pitch left went to loose
boulders, a low continuation and before that another pitch. The other
way didn't go very far, low down, but level with the lower entry the
pitch continued. Olly went here till he got to a big aven/chamber/pitch
type thing, and I sat and got cold cos my arm hurt where I scalded it in
the morning. We surveyed half of it on the way out and found some old
survey notes on the floor - we plan to photo them before moving them out
of the cave.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-14
Richard Mundy, Ollie Stevens, Dave Loeffler, Andreas Forsberg,
204 - Rhino Rift
Andreas joined us, all the way from Sweden, hunting meteorites, in
order to check out our link from the previous day. A couple of survey
legs swiftly led to where we had been. Dave was thus revealed as a
prophet of some considerable power and cemented the respect of us novice
cavers. Rather an easy task compared to the 200m surveying and rigging
task of the previous day. A and B leads are thought to extend from the
top of a pitch linking "Uncomformity" to the passage linking "Shetland
Incline".
We progressed to explore 03-90A. This involved Dave cutting our old
(2003) 11mm rope into lots of teeny bits. We dropped down a very
satisfyingly shaped (rounded cross section) pitch onto a stony floor. A
climb led to a further pitch. Andreas and I were left here whilst Dave
and Ollie went back to peer at some other QM's. As I became bored, I
climbed up to watch Andreas rig. I observed that one natural in his
Y-hang was not a solid column of rock, but instead two rocks entirely
disconnected from anything. Dave had started rigging from it and now
Andreas was rigging from it. Andreas later admitted feeling considerable
fear when I wriggled the rock he was rigging off! After a change of plan
we descended. The end was dull, but Andreas kicked some mud. This
impromptu dig was hastened by the sound of water "a sump" Andreas
claimed. In fact a tiny grim loose chamber with a 2cm squared puddle! We
got out having discovered this "Spitters End". Less than the previous
day's 200 metres of survey, but still satisfying.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-14
Nial Peters, Edvin Deadman, Kathryn Hopkins, Djuke Veldhuis, Sarah White,
204 - The Gaffered rebolting project
After the previous rigging trip I decided that the Gaffered rig could
be greatly improved with a few extra bolts. With lots of novices keen to
learn to bolt and an abundance of hand bolting gear (well, 3 sets) this
seemed like the perfect opportunity to sort the rig out once and for
all. Myself and Edvin went ahead to re-rig the Eyehole and Trihang
leaving the others to practice some bolting and rigging by installing a
traverse line between Gaffer Tape and Tape Worm. Edvin installed two new
spits at the top of the Eyehole pitch meaning you no longer have to
squeeze through the eyehole. This rig is perfect! Why was it not rigged
like this in the first place!? While Edvin did this, I put in an
additional spit at the top of Trihang in order to allow it to be rigged
as a Trihang (how was this done before?). Further improvements to the
rig include a deviation on Gaffer Tape just below the first re-belay
(this looks a bit strange, but it stops the rope rubbing when you swing
across for the second re-belay). A deviation on the Lx pitch also makes
staying out of the slot above the re-belay easier.
Having finished the rigging Edvin and I started pushing leads in the
Underworld. We started with 04-15B, now called "Shprinkles Pitch." This
is a ~15m pitch down leading to a sharp rifty passage which is too
tight. One wall of the pitch is made entirely of mud, which rains down
on you as you descend - hence the name. We were then joined by Djuke who
had left the other two bolting and had come to join us. The three of us
went to look at 03-14B (which looks to be the same lead as 03-15B). This
is a steeply sloping tube (-50deg) down near the start of Sirens
traverse. It descended for ~15m before becoming vertical. It has a
strong draft and looks like a promising lead! However, we were out of
time and headed back. the whole trip took 12 1/4 hours.
Meanwhile at the bottom of Gaffer Tape.....
Kathryn Sarah and Djuke started to bolt the traverse between
the bottom of Gaffer Tape and the Tape Worm pitch. The traverse had not
previously been protected, but a slip there could be very serious, so it
was decided that a rope was a good idea. None of the the three of us had
much experience bolting, and so we had many aborted attempts. We only
had one bolting kit between the three of us, and this meant we got quite
cold, so Djuke decideded to find Edvin and Nial in the Underworld. Sarah
and Kathryn eventually placed 4 bolts of varying quality and rigged the
traverse, by which time it was too late to join the others pushing in
the Underworld, and so they headed out.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-14
Mark Dougherty, Mark Shinwell, Anthony Day, , *Gabor (Hungarian)
Surface Prospecting - northwest of 204e
Surface prospecting northwest of 204e. Descended surface shaft -
which panned out as follows:
The pitch lands in a largish chamber 'Professor Rushton's Lecture
Hall'. At one end a small room is choked and at the other s a very
narrow rift (impassable) from which the draft comes.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-15
Jenny Black, Olly Betts,
Cairn Cave - 2006-70 (Cairn Cave) and Marilyn Monroe Hoehle
Jenny was (uncharacteristically) not feeling well so she sat in what
little shade there was, while I went underground. First, at Cairn cave I
put in a tag spit, then used that plus a thread backup and two
protectors to descend. The pitch head is awkward, then bells out to
land on a rubble floor with a dirty snowplug. A chink of light enters
upslope from a nearby shaft, while downslope the roof lowers and chokes.
This is the source of the outward draft noted at the entrance.
Then onto 148- I entered in thermals plus oversuit and drilled and
set two spits for the pitch which bypasses the squeeze and climb. Then
surface surveyed from 148 to 2006-70.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-15
Anthony Day, Mark Dougherty,
204 - Razordance Rig
The previous day's team had rigged to GLAD (God Loves a Drunk). Our
plan was to continue the rig as near to the pushing front as possible,
so that a later team could come in and do a quick push. We also
intended to install some radon detectors and tidy up various bits of
rigging. I put in a higher bolt on the last hang in Ariston and was
preparing to descend Kiwi Seat when Mark's bottom exploded. He elected
to carry on and caught up with me at the bottom of the first Kiwi Suit
pitch where I was installing an extra traverse bolt. Our next job was a
bolt for a handline on Dave Dives. Mark drilled a hole, at which point
we found that the Hilti pot was missing. It turned out that I had left
them at the side of the previous bolts - fortunately they were retrieved
by a later party - so the second wave could use the drill. Dumped the
drill at GLAD, and continued rigging through Tun and Copper. Put in a
handbolt for a deviation on Yeast which looks to have sorted out the rig
a treat. At that pitch we called it a day and headed out, meeting the
second wave at GLAD. Out at 19.30 and bolted down the hill.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-15
Edvin Deadman, Kathryn Hopkins, Aaron Curtis,
204 - 204e Crowning Glory exploration
On the 13th the three of us went pushing the end of Crowning Glory,
an A grade lead. As a starry eyed novice, I was expecting a kilometre
of passage leading either to Tunnockschacht, a new entrance or
Kaninchenhoehle. Instead, the passage just fizzled out! It rapidly
became too tight, although we did find an impressive aven on the left,
which didn't lead anywhere. On the way back, we bolted and descended a
new pitch. A 20 metre descent led to a squeeze down into a chamber that
looked like it needed a handline.
On the 15th Kathryn and I, went back and went back into this chamber:
turned out to be a 6m pitch with a very dodgy squeeze onto the pitch
head. The chamber led nowhere but had a hole in the ground. Standing in
the hole, the floor started to vanish beneath us, revealing a deep
looking rift which unfortunately looks too tight to descend.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-15
Nial Peters,
204 - 204a - The New Gaffered Rigging Guide
Notes
- Pitches 4-8 can all be strung together with 150-160m rope
- 11mm rope is preferable due to the large amounts of mud
- Take a scrubbing brush to the bottom of Trihang for washing
ascenders and wellies
- Tying the bottom of the Cerberus pitch rope to something would be a
good idea - it is easy to pull up the end with you!
- Possible QM above Trihang pitch head. Up and behind the pitch head
appears to be a tube heading left. Requires bolting up to (although only
a couple of metres).
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-15
Nial Peters, Sarah White, , *Hungarian Cavers
204 - 204a - Razordance
Tourist trip down 204a as far as Razordance to show our Hungarian
visitors around Steinbrucken. They all seemed very impressed, especially
with the pitches. However, one was overhead to say that there was too
much prussiking! Trip took 6hrs. The temperature in Kiwi Suit was
0.4°C.
The Hungarians were very keen to see more of the cave so I took Dodo
and Gabor on a through trip from 204e to 204d. The snow was low so the
climb out of d was easy. A top trip, I had forgotten how good it
was!
We are all invited to go caving in Hungary. If you fancy it then
contact Gabor by email.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-15
Dave Loeffler, Andreas Forsberg,
204 - Continuation of Razordance rig
Headed in with 2 smallish bags of rope. Met Dour and MSD at God Loves
A Drunk, where we heard the grim tales of Mark's loose bowels and Dour's
missing hiltis which I had picked up at Kiwi Suit (thanks to Sarah for
spotting the pot lying on a rock).
We decided to ditch the 94m pushing rope and continue in with the
drill and rope for known pitches. This was a lovely idea but forgot to
take into account the bag of rope sitting at Yeast pitch.
Some shuttling of stuff through the rift soon saw the pitches rigged
as far as Pepper Pot. Here we managed to totally miss Paster of Muppets
pitch and rig the traverse with that rope instead.
Andreas did the drilling to improve the traverse at the 2004 limit.
As luck would have it we got as far as the pitch and the drill
completely ran out of juice so we headed out.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-16
Aaron Curtis,
Top Camp - On obtaining alcohol at top camp - password protect
For the past 3 days, four friendly Hungarians who got in touch with
us through Stuart Bennett have visited us. Thery accomplished a tourist
trip down to Kiwi Suit, and carried enough gear to camp self
sufficiently. More notably, they carried a substantial volume of
intoxicating liquids - enough to keep top camp happy for a night or two.
In the interest of maintaining contact with these amiable cavers and
discovering a potential future source of life-sustaining fluid, their
contact emails are: gabor dot losonci at gmail dot com and adam dot
panker at gmail dot com. tel. 00-36-20-5200-665.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-16
Richard Mundy, Nial Peters, Kathryn Hopkins,
204 - Underworld
Given previous Rhino Rift and surface prospecting exploits, I allowed
myself to be tempted into a deeper expedition by Nial, despite wise seer
Dave's protestations that I wouldn't find much onward in the
Underworld.
We firstly took a promising lead from Terra Firma. I was 'on notes'
for the first time and had no clue what was going on. It disapointingly
linked quickly to Quiz Rift.
We then moved on to peering down a pitch from Quiz Rift. This
continued over a ledge to a rocky downward, becoming a muddy upward, as
is the way with the Underworld. A sharp rocky crawl led up and back to
the pitch and a downward squeeze, deemed too tight without capping,
seemed to lead downward onto a pitch.
Miserable squirmings led to the bottom of a pitch which Nial climbed
up, making me promise to catch him if he fell. Bastard. He then spied
two hard-to-reach 'C' leads up there and a further pitch close by. Two
tiny holes linked the bottom of our pitch with this further pitch. I
tried digging the lower of these and failed. Thus Nial told Kathryn to
squeeze feet first through the tiny upper one, into a 2m drop. Bastard.
Sure enough, this led nowhere. We labelled this 'Dangerous Dig and the
Gut-Busters'. A rubbish bit of nasty cave.
Sure enough Nial made it worse by then forcing me up an earlier lead.
This had a squeeze which involved removing SRT kit and hammering off
protruberances. The passage grew rifty before becoming too tight.
We surveyed a reasonable bit, but I resolve to charge Nial a 'shit
cave tax' for his transgressions. The upward pitches went on for ever,
Gaffered itself being especially epic with horrid rebelay. Lower
pitches mud on rope requires manual manipulation of jamming cams. We
finally got out for noodles and hot chocolate (mixed with vile spirit
Unicum - not as tasty as ejaculate) after an exhasting 13hr trip.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-17
Olly Betts, Jenny Black,
148 - (Maralin Munroe)
Went back to 148 with a drill and more rope. Went to the previous
pitch and traversed over it to what was 'the pitch' in 1987 nice big
aven & pitch Olly found a nice rig down and into a little rift -> thus
avoiding the loose choss at the top. Looked at the Ice Castle route
first, this roughly goes back under the higher shaft past some very
cool ice formations (big icicles) and very old snow plugs -> one section
the snow plug essentially filled the entire passage except for a small
crawl underneath it which I found a bit unnerving. More ice & snow,
including a snow plug with clear Summer / Winter layering, I saw at
least 30 layers (and it continued high up as well, so the oldest snow
was older than me!). This passage ended at an up pitch maybe 15m high.
Surveyed back along this (noting that the hanging death in the ceiling
was quite varied -- rocks, snow and ice. Back at the 20ish m pitch we
took the continuation passage, initially promising -- a huge rift
heading for 107, but soon turns a corner and chokes (as noted in 1987).
I climbed up before the choke and over the top and sadly no continuation
visible. Olly poked under the choke and you could see into the blackness
inside...
Surveyed this and left the cave.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-18
Duncan Collis, Mark Dougherty, Anthony Day,
204 - Razordance
We got underground at 9:30 and made rapid progress down to God Loves
a Drunk, Mark pausing en-route to swap his radon detectors. Regrouping
at GLAD we brewed up a couple of packets of soup and a dehydrated meal
to fuel us up for the push.
At 1pm we reached the front and started to rig and survey onwards.
Mark wielded the drill, I weilded the pencil and Dour brought up the
rear with a shetland attack pony.
Four and a half hours later we had descended five pitches and were
looking down a sixth, with no hiltis left and precious few hangers, so
we headed out via another very welcome soup at GLAD.
According to the survey data, 204 now has a vertical range of 599.99m.
T/U Duncan 12.5, MarkD 12, Dour 14
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-18
Olly Betts, Jenny Black,
2007-72 - Batter pot (2007-72)
It was a bit cloudy so decided that surface shaft might be feasible.
Went to look at an entrance Olly spotted in 2005 roughly above Pancake
Chips aven. It draughts slightly out and is sloping down on the side of
a shakehole. Needed to move some rocks out of the way to get in. Sadly
it didn't go much more than 10m, the draught comes out of a 5-10cm wide
rift, which appears after a few metres to open up. There is another
route lower down which checked and didn't draught. Surveyed this and
surface surveyed this to Ice Curtain cave and on to 99. Went out to look
for 102 to tie it into the surface survey as the GPS fix is old and
thought to be suspect. Sadly failed to find it so will have to
return.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-19
Richard Mundy, Ollie Stevens, Aaron Curtis,
Surface Prospecting - Surface messing
After an 11 hour and a 9 hour trip, Ollie and I fancied a day off.
We travelled to Rundereisehoehle with Aaron in order to wire and start
some data loggers. We had installed thermistors 3 days before, Aaron and
I not setting a call out and thus prompting a rescue to begin at
nightfall! The weather was scorching (hence Ollie's radiation burns all
over) in contrast to last week's snow. We did well, apart from Aaron
falling and filling his USB cable with dirt, rendering it useless to
start data loggers.
Later in the day Ollie and I went surface prospecting. We found a
promising hole on the ridge just behind 03-01. We now consider this a
rediscovery of 2003-02. Our journey onwards was not fruitful, but on our
return leg, not a couple of hundred metres from the bivi, we came across
an area riddled with uncharted cave. We tagged 2007-01 and Ollie sent me
down (I was geared up). A vertical climb down opened into a hollow
plate a few metres down. A boulder floor made the "C" QM in the floor
dangerous. An edge exit was too tight. Many vertical openings existed
in a similar place. We tagged one, 2007-02, but did not descend.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-19
Julia Bradshaw, Dour,
Surface Prospecting - Useful Walkies
Thought I'd make myself useful by re-tagging and photoing some
entrances. First stop was Skinny Festerers, which has now been tagged
with its kataster number 244. We also photoed the entrance. Would make a
reasonable shitting grike for those who don't mind a slightly longer
walk.
Further down the backside of the Hinter we GPSed a small hole at the
foot of a cliff. Body-sized entrance led to a small chamber with a
too-tight rift and a choked shaft. Not long enough to be a proper cave.
Possibility that this is something previously noted by Dunks. Yep. GPS
confirms that we re-found 2002-x09.
Getting a bit out of sequence here, forgot to say that we tried and
failed to find 247, had a hunt where the GPS said it was but no luck.
Will study the entrance photo and try again.
Found and photoed 2003-01, which doesn't seem to have been allocated
a kataster number yet, not sure why. 248 has now been tagged as such and
photoed. Wen to Rock'n'Roll Hoehle and photoed the entrance. Found a
tagged marked 2001-04B, not 239. No knowing that the A and B entrances
are in the same shakehole we assumed that the nearest large hole was
239A. In fact this is probably 2003-X16, Earl and Becka's cave 7.
Went and hid in the shade of the bridge for a bit then walked to 242
and took pics. Anthony set off in search of a hole near 204D that needed
re-tagging then changed his mind. On the way down the hill he put the
correct tag on Artischokenhoehle. All photos (with notes) on computer
under photos/Julia.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-19
Olly Betts, Jenny Black,
161 - 161d
Went to 161d partly to place a radon detector for Mark D and because
I wanted to see what KH was like. Walked up to the col to get onto the
161 path, it was really hot and horribly humid. The path was fairly
clear up to where the Vord path goes up - perhaps this is used as a
walkers path to the summit? Path was then less defined and many cairns
had collapsed. I thought (wrongly it turned out) that we were too high
up the Vord side and we could see a faint path with cairns leading up
towards the Hinter. Followed this for a bit uphill to the crest of the
ridge and then down a bit to 161d. Already running out of water and it
was so hot. Finally got to VD1 and the path down to 161d. This bit of
the path wasn't as bad as I had feared but took a while as a lot of the
cairns had collapsed and Olly had only been here once before and me
never. Finally got to the entrance after hours.
The draught was amazing and nice and refreshing. Followed in to
Triassic Park. Amazing cave, nice and big and still a noticeable draught.
We so need to find something like this in 76, in fact the only thing 76
does better is the hanging death - the Guillotine isn't even trying.
Walked up to the top of Knossos (noticed a hibernating bat on the
way) admiring the huge passage. Were able to refill the water bottle at
a drip which was very nice. Returned leaving the radon detector in TP
quite near the Guillotine (about 3m from the conservation tape and
reflective marker we placed). Had a look at Staud'nwirt Palace and into
Zombie Slime which no longer has a ladder in situ (as suggested on the
website). Returned looking at the skull in Golgotha on the way.
Surfaced to find it getting dark and a BIG thunderstorm in progress.
Decided the walk/climb back in the dark and rain would be unpleasant and
might well result in us being lost on a ledge somewhere. Figured it
would be best to wait underground till either the storm stopped or the
sun rose. Found a sheltered alcove in Mothshag and moved some rocks to
make a "bed", made a mattress from the rope, my rucksack and our wellies
and both got into a survival bag. Waited couple of hours till we got
pretty cold and noticed the drips had decreased. It had stopped raining
and was a clear starry night!
Made our way back to the car, managed the scrambles and climbs OK
without handlines and Ol navigated very well. Got to base camp at about
6am ....
Have at least got our annual long walk in the dark over with early in
the expo and it was made much better by the amazingly bright Princeton
Tech headtorch that could spot cairns miles away. And us being at 161d
with our waterproofs at 76 solved the water shortage nicely as well.
T/U 7 hrs (3 of which were waiting for the storm to end)
T/walking: lots ...
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-19
Ollie Stevens, Sarah White, Richard Mundy,
204 - The 11 second rattle story
It all began with one rock, one pitch, a stopwatch and a certain lack
of imagination on the part of those naming the pitch. It should at this
point be noted that it actually rattles for longer than 11 seconds. But
I digress. Armed with 105m of rope, Richard, Sarah and I began the
arduous task of negotiating Chocolate Salty Balls on the way to the
11SR, with the minor detour of liberating 33m of rope from 'Taking the
Piss.' This rope had clearly been affected by its oppressor as it was the
fastest rope I have ever witnessed. Still, I got my own back by using a
full turn round my breaking krab and twisting the hell out of it.
After rigging the short pitch above the 11SR with a deviation
Superman himself would have difficulty passing thanks to a school of
rigging that involves ignoring obvious spits and letting the location of
naturals decide the path the rig will take, we finally met the
proverbial 11 second rattle.
Having carried a full suite of power-bolting equipment with us it
seemed sensible to put in a Y-hang with the drill. It is often noted
that problems between the keyboard and chair are the main source of
computer problems, in this case I suppose the problem existed between
the muddy floor and the trigger, when we found that the drill was not
nearly as effective in reverse. I blame my thermodynamics lectures for
teaching me that reversible systems are most efficient and my education
at Cambridge for leaving me with no common sense. With a new burst of
enthusiasm after realising our mistake, and the drill firmly switched to
forwards we continued to drill. It is indicative of the human ability
for learning that during the second attempt at a hole we noted more
quickly that the drill was still in reverse.
One and a half holes later the drill decided that all this changing
direction was a bit too much and refused to go on.
We went all Old Skool on the hole's ass and cracked out the hand
bolting gear. One perfectly placed spit later, and we continued on our
journey. I abseiled down a few metres to place a survey station whilst
Sarah and Richard admired my beautiful spit placement, awe-stricken at
its poise, dedication and charm. One survey leg for good measure later,
and it was time to go home. Nothing would prepare us for the following
day's events. To be continued ...
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-19
Kathryn Hopkins, Djuke Veldhuis,
204 - Slimy Sludge Chute
We continued pushing the lead that Djuke, Edvin and Nial started on
14th July (03-14/C) armed with a little more rope. the lead is in
steeply sloping tube - it starts as a scramble down and then quickly
becomes too steep and a rope is needed. After this steep section, the
gradient becomes shallower, and it is possible to get off the rope and
scramble down again. Exploration ended when we reached the end of our
rope (~50m) and the passage became too steep to be able to climb up. At
this point we reached where the passage widened and split into multiple
holes - "like cheese" according to Djuke. The hole was still strongly
drafting - it was very cold surveying.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-19
Edvin Deadman, Nial Peters,
204 - Rigging down to Fat worm blows a Sparky
The plan was to rig down then push an A-grade lead for a bit on the
Flat Worm level. So obviously things were never quite going to pan out
that way. We got down to the Underworld without incident (although
tacklesacks are an absolute bastard to carry). Nial started rigging
Gardener's World and Universally Challenged [sic - University Challenge]
(who thinks of these names, seriously!) before realising we didn't have
enough rope of the right length. After a bit of cheeky rebolting and
jiggling of ropes we managed to get down. A few minutes scrambling
around through some pretty passage brought us to the next pitch. It
probably has a stupid name [Chalk and Cheese]. Nial rigged this on some
11mm rope so slow you could abseil down it without a stop, and you still
wouldn't need a braking crab. The rope was kind of just about long
enough. We got to Thin Rift and as far as the previous pushing front
where a [lack of] handline had prevented the previous explorers getting
any further. Unfortunately, 5m later we realised we needed either a
traverse line over the top of the rift along a ledge or another handline
down to the bottom. So we only rigged to do an extra 2 survey legs, but
the rift was still going so we were keen to go back. Nial will now put
the new Gardener's World rigging guide below ....
(mwah ... hah ... ha ... I nicked your space [different handwriting]
damn you Mundy [Edvin's handwriting; note no rigging guide!]
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-19
Dave Loeffler, Andreas Forsberg, James Carlisle,
204 - Razor Dance
Our hopes of an early start were sabotaged by the realisation that
the drill battery was (a) flat and (b) broken. Several hours of charging
and some gaffer later, we got underground around noon.
At the pushing front, James + I cowered damply while Andreas rigged
the pitch with a Y-hang + rebelay 2m further down. This landed in an
elongated rift chamber, with a fairly narrow but ruler-straight slot
leading off. Andreas went ahead with the bolting gear while we started
surveying.
The slot widened out somewhat + a scramble up onto a ledge led to a
keyhole-type phreatic tunnel + slot in the floor. Andreas rigged a
traverse where the slot began to widen + reached a stance overlooking a
deep, dark pool of water.
Andreas attempted to answer the question 'is this a sump?' by
traversing out along the ledge to see round a corner, but ran out of
battery. So we headed out, leaving the depth certainly over 600m.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-20
Richard Mundy, Djuke Veldhuis,
204 - Slimy Sludge Chute continued
Having forgotten the misery of my last trip down to the Underworld
(cold, mud, tightness, nastiness), I allowed myself to be dragged down
there by Djuke. Kathryn had wisely decided to abandon this lead.
The chute itself is steep, tight and horrid. A cold wind blows up it
and a wet mud transfers itself all over you. Sharp "popcorn" exists
everywhere and has ripped the arse from my oversuit.
Surveying with the Pony I was becoming rapidly fed up, even given
some interesting phreatic passage branching off. Eventually we were
rewarded for our efforts when the shute tipped into the top of a chamber,
The Happy Hippocampus. Some bolting warmed me nicely and I soon
dangled onto a boulder floor set in mud slopes. Other passages led in to
the chamber ceiling (circa 15m up) and other leads included a boulder
choke and a steep mud and boulder climb down. The chamber is around 10m
in diameter. We decided to leave further exploration for when we have
courage, so beat an exhausting retreat.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-20
Kathryn Hopkins, Edvin Deadman, Nial Peters,
204 - Convenience Series
We returned to the lead Edvin and Nial started on the 19th (Thin Rift
off Dead Good Bat chamber in Fat Worm). At the pushing front there was
the option of a pitch down or rigging a traverse across the rift. We
opted for the pitch option, hoping it would drop into the bottom of the
same rift as the traverse rift - unfortunately there was no way on at
the bottom of the pitch, so we rigged the traverse instead:
[rigging diagram - flake then big loop of slack for hand line down slope then thread then
traverse tied off at end. 20m rope just enough]
After the traverse the passage continued and there was a side passage
off to the right (returned to later). The rift continued upwards and to
the right until it reached a "toilet bowl" shaped [undecipherable word -
underrig?] where we climbed down and doubled back on ourselves to a
shallow pool of water. Through the pool to the right led to a climb down
into a rift (returned to later). At this point Edvin and Nial went to
survey the side passage mentioned earlier (ended in a QM D) while I
started to bolt the pitch down the hole that we previously traversed
across. At the bottom of the pitch (Flush Pitch), to the right
through a crawl (Ballcock Bypass), back to the bottom of the
chamber with the pool (The Cistern). We then returned to the
climb down across the other side of the pool - this dropped into a rift
(Now Wash Your Hands) which went both ways. First we went left
down the rift, which was a little awkward and tight - we passed a side
passage at floor level (QM B) and exploration ended at a pitch down (QM
A). The passage appeared to continue across the other side of the pitch
(QM A), but a traverse line is needed to get across safely. We then
explored the rift in the other direction (right after the climb down
from the Cistern). This also ended in a pitch and passed a small,
upward-sloping tube on the left (QM A).
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-21
Frank Tully, Phil Underwood, George North, Pete Harley,
journey - Flooding in England
Basically I'm working in Scotland so on the Friday I drove from
Glasgow to Bristol. However, it was very very wet.
Took 5 hours to get to Manchester then the M6 slowed down to creep
speed. I forgot it was the first weekend of the summer holidays so
every caravan in the UK was on the move.
Torrential rain so eventually got to south of Birmingham by 6.30 -
another 6 hours driving. Continued driving at snails pace however all
was not looking good.
By 8.00 the slow lane north of Tewkesbury was 8" deep in water. By
9.30 the fast lane was 6" deep and the slow lane was too deep for
lorries. There were cars broken down on the hard shoulder with the
water up to their windows.
I was approx 150 cars back from the point where the police closed the
M5.
Then the highways agency took over... The rain stopped at 11pm but it
took the highways agency another six hours to notice. I was released
back onto the motorway at 05.30. Got an hours kip.
Then to start packing - bit of a rush considering I was to pick up Mr
Underwood in Reading. However, the railways were closed south of
Birmingham.
So at the last possible minute Phil found a train that was going to
stansted.
Anyway, it all came together. Packed in 2 hours - drove to Stansted -
found Phil and George. Drove to M25-A12 junction found Pete. Got to
Dover hour late - no problem. Drove to Austria in 12 hours. MCE.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-22
Julia Bradshaw,
Surface Prospecting - More Useful Walkies
Having been down the hill and acquired a picture of the 247 entrance
I went back to where the GPS said it should be and there it was, I'd
been stood right on top of it the last time. So 247 now has its correct
tag.
Then I went to 2002-09 and tagged it. The entrance is about 30cm by
30cm and goes in at a bearing of 165°. There's one small chamber with a
too-tight rift and choked shaft. Don't think this should be assigned a
kataster number as it is v. small. The tag is above the entrance, a
photo showing the location of the tag is on the computer.
Next I went to Earl and Becka's cave 7 and tagged it as 2003-16.
Photos on the computer. The freeclimable entrance was very tempting but
in the end I didn't risk it as I was on my own. Will hopefully get to
stick my nose down there before going home.
Finally retagged Rock'n'Roll Hoehle (B) with the correct 239B and
checked that the A entrance was tagged correctly which it be. Photos of
both entrances on the computer. Yes, this was a very boring logbook
entry but that's just tough.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-22
Duncan Collis, Anthony Day,
204 - Razor Dance
The previous trip down Razor Dance had returned with tales of a deep
pool that they had started traversing around to where they could see
into a perpendicular rift with running water audible. Could this be the
bottom? The target for this trip was to continue the traverse into the
side rift to find out whether the sound of water was a continuation or
an inlet.
Set off down at 10:30 with Dunks in the lead. I was therefore
surprised (and a little perturbed) to arrive at the pushing front to
find no sign of him. I soon heard him thrutching through the rift. It
turns out that he had missed the traverse level below Yeast pitch had
had thrashed through at stream level to emerge at a ~15-20m pitch with
no rope on it - presumably where the water drops in at Pepper Pot.
Before continuing the traverse we opted to try one of the
self-heating meals provided by Andrew that the Welsh diggers 'swear by
not at'. After following the instructions to the letter and waiting the
requisite 15 minutes, it was still stone cold, so we scoffed it
anyway.
Duncan then started work on the traverse. Andreas had bolted along a
ledge on the right-hand wall (opposite the cross-rift). Duncan elected
to take out his last two bolts and bolt on the left-hand wall instead,
then he bridged across the (narrower) cross rift. Some time later I
followed, hating every minute of it (so I took the opportunity to spit
into a pot).
It turns out that the sound of water in the side rift comes from an
inlet, and that the deep pool is a sump - so 204 is now 622m deep. A bit
disappointing that it didn't go deeper, but at least we've bottomed the
bastard.
The inlet is keyhole passage with ~3m round phreatic part elongate
along the dip direction, and a trench that is typically 5m deep,
trending upwards at 25°. We surveyed up this for ~70m before running
out of time. Our last survey station is by a junction where the main
route continues for ~40m to a climb which may or may not be climbable,
and an inlet rift that is passable for some distance. With that we
headed out with the drill and spare metalwork at a sedate pace (set by
my), pausing for a food stop at GLAD. Duncan emerged at 04:50, and I got
out at 06:20.
Duncan had a suspicion that the inlet contained water from the
Midnight in Moscow series. Survex reinforced this suspicion: if you
project the inlet up at its current angle for ~100m along and ~25m up,
it will hit the bottom of Rasputin in 161 - so hopes are high for a
connection, which would be a satisfactory 2nd prize after its failure to
go very deep.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-22
Olly Betts, Jenny Black,
148 - Surveying
Went to MM [Marilyn Munroe] with the aim of surveying and finishing
everything below the 48m rope so we could de-rig it and rig it in 76.
Headed down and checked out the 3rd option from the bottom of the pitch
(noted in 1987 to end at an ice climb). Smallish rift passage apparently
directly underneath the passage above with a boulder floor/ceiling
inbetween. Olly climbed up to the 1st squeeze and decided he would need
to remove his helmet so retreated. I had a look and got through, and
wriggled up the next climb and attempted the next squeeze which had a
boulder in the way. I could get all of me through except one leg (could
get either leg through, but not both). I got very annoyed and eventually
gave up. I believed I could see where the ice climb was - this year it
was just wet, but appears to take you back to the passage above (the
survey confirms this). So getting through the squeeze wouldn't achieve
much.
Survey this and joined together the hanging surveys from the previous
week (which made me happy) and surveyed out, derigging the 48m en route.
Paused in the survey to look at the remaining lead (the pitch roughly
below the aven with daylight). Olly went some way down, confirming that
the draught does come from here and that it appears to continue.
Incidentally, the survey suggests that the aven with daylight is ~5m
from the 204 path, so please don't throw rocks down shafts in this area
....
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-23
Richard Mundy, Ollie Stevens, Andreas Forsberg,
204 - 11 Second Rattle
"The Widowmaker" by Sarah White
Abandon hope all ye who enter here.
versus
"The Reliant Swede" by Andreas Forsberg
Rigging diagram - 3 rebelays and 5 deviations
The previous page illustrates the work done on our trip of 23rd July.
We adapted the 11 Second Rattle rig to one that can be descended without
"Brown Alert" ensueing.
Andreas commented that "this is the worst shaft that I have ever
seen" (for rigging difficulty), yet proceeded to reduce Sarah's 7 rope
to one trivial one.
Andreas then helped us to descend "The Super Fun Happy Slide"
into "Wet Dry World" - via the placement of a bolt using his
skyhook and much discomfort.
The slide is a phreatic tube downward at 45°ree;. A pretty bit of
cave, dropping into the roof of Wet Dry World, a chamber with a
rocky/bouldery floor, a boulder choke, many holes in the ceiling, some
squeezes in the walls and some water dripping down one wall.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-23
Nial Peters, Kathryn Hopkins, Edvin Deadman,
204 - Convenience Series
We returned to the new stuff we'd found to push it some more. We had
cleverly decided to look at the most miserable lead: a narrow rift
leading off "Now Wash Your Hands" which needed rigging as a traverse
across a hole or down the hole. We got to the pushing front without
incident, adding a handline to the climb down to Now Wash Your Hands
(how on earth did we ever free climb it?!).
I bolted and rigged a traverse across a hole (now know as Don't Worry
Pee Happy) whilst Nial and Kathryn surveyed a miserable QM which went
nowhere (actually it carried on - now a QM C - Kathryn). Over the
traverse we surveyed round in a loop back to the traverse, passing a QM
which needs rigging but almost certainly links in to the bottom of Don't
Worry Pee Happy.
Nial rigged Don't Worry Pee Happy, a ~20m pitch. He forgot to take
rigging gubbins down the pitch with him so when he realised a rebelay
was needed we slid slings, bolts, etc down the rope. There were two ways
on at the bottom. The first went down a pit before stopping. The second
required reigging and went down a further ~10m down to a miserable
looking duck/wet crawl which looked thoroughly uninspiring. We decided
not to go through, but Aven tells us that it's only 6-7m away from the
Subway level so might be worth another look.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-23
Olly Betts, Jenny Black,
76 - Rigging and radon detecting
Finally got to 76, Olly rigged down to The Ledge and I followed half
an hour later to take a bag of rope through to BNW for the next trip and
the radon detectors to place. The radon detectors were placed in the
side lead in the test tubes roughly opposite the 99 connection. Surface
surveyed 102 to 103. Tagged 1998-X01 and Ice Curtain.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-23
Dave Loeffler, Djuke Veldhuis,
2002-AD-01 - 2007-11, Surface Prospecting
Surface prospecting and cave tagging in the northern most area of
CUCC territory. Tagged one of Anthony Day's cave finds [02AD01 in scan, 02AD03 in photo]. Also found a new
one and then the GPS ran out of battery and we walked back. In addition
to doing the Loser via ferrata and walking up to top camp this ended a
nicely varied day!!!
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-24
Andreas Forsberg, Mark Dougherty, George North,
204 - Razordance -> The Forbidden City
The trip was originally intended to compose of Andreas, James
and myself, but unfortunately James was feeling a touch ill, and so Mark
stepped in to take his place. The weather was looking a little overcast,
but still dry and we made a late-ish start at 11:00am. All went smoothly
until we reached the top of Copper pitch where we heard an ominous
rumble/whistling noise in the distance. Although we all heard this noise
we stayed quiet until we reached the following pitch whereupon it became
obvious that the water levels were rising. A couple of minutes later the
water levels had reached impressive heights! After a brief discussion we
decided to press on into the drier part of the rift.
Although the lower pitches were a bit damp none of them proved too
wet so we carried on to do some pushing. At the top of the long slippery
ramp that Dunks and Dour had explored two days previously we took a left
turn into a steeply ascending dry passage. We followed this up 10-15
short free climbs, via some quite nice formations. Eventually we reached
a phreatic tunnel which levelled out, and then started to head downhill.
Sensing that a connection with KH was imminent we ditched the
instruments and went for a poke around.
A low sandy crawl emerged 2m up the wall of what was clearly a very
large passage. Unfortunately the climb down was a bit on the suicidal
side so we tried a lower crawl that emerged a bit closer to the floor.
Although still a little on the loose and necky side we all reached the
bottom and set up off the large 6m diameter tunnel. Downslope a stream
could be heard (Midnight in Moscow?) and upslope gave us some fine long
survey legs until an impressive echo started to sound. The source of the
echo was a ~40m diameter chamber which was greeted with much whooping.
Several leads go off from this and after we did a few survey legs across
it we headed out.
Again all went smoothly, we stopped for some food at GLAD, until we
reached Mystery Wind pitch where it became clear that the cave was
flooding again, only this time rather more so. It was some relief that
we reached the bottom of Kiwi Suit which was very cool, windy and wet.
The amount of water now flowing down RD was at least 10 x that of when
we had entered. I couldn't help thinking that we had got out just in the
nick of time. After a long and tedious prussik we all eventually all
reached the surface at 00:30 -> 01:00. An excellent trip!
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-24
Olly Betts, Jenny Black,
76 - Sea of holes
Went into BNW with the drill and rigging gear to start looking at the
pitch leads close to QM 05- because it had been raining hard for hours
and it looked to be the driest option - in fact it was very dry, only a
few slightly drippy bits. Olly traversed across the lip of the Pleasant
But Pointless pitch, because of all the gear he was carrying it became a
bolt traverse this year, not a bold traverse that it was in 2005 when I
first saw the pitch. Olly got through to the pitch having scrambled
through the rocks (this is called Scrabble) and bolted down the
first short drop. This was a little drippy but the water disappeared
through the rocky floor. A ramp comes in from above (?perhaps this
connects with the boulder choke in Loopy?). This continues into a rift
with various holes and rock bridge that all connect, giving it its name,
Sea Of Holes. Olly rigged an excellent Y-hang to a level with
solid ledges and started down the next pitch. We ran out of hangers,
slings and warmth before the pitch ended, so surveyed out. I coped
better with the traverse on the way out.
Sea of Holes has nice, solid rock, isn't too wet, doesn't have much
choss and draughts fairly strongly (given the size) outwards which is
very cool. On the way out we noticed the draught had reversed (around
11pm to midnightish), hopefully this won't affect the radon
detecting.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-24
Dave Loeffler, Djuke Veldhuis, Frank Tully,
204 - The Happy Hippocampus
Frank Tully (for a bit)
Down Gaffered to explore chamber ("The Happy Hippocampus") below
Slimy Sludge Shute (a right hand lead just before Sirens Traverse).
Found out I should improve future rigging. Happy (aka stressful, muddy,
in small, sharp passageway derigging the Slimy Sludge Shute.
Then went into the Subsoil levels (turning down existing A-lead,
right hand side as you come down Chalk and Cheese pitch). As expected,
bolting down into the chamber at the end of the A lead confirmed that it
also emerged in the "Happy Hippocampus" chamber hence joining the
Underworld and Subsoil levels :-). YAY.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-25
Richard Mundy, Ollie Stevens, Sarah White,
204 - Upper levels of 204e
On the 24th we had a day of top camp festering. Sarah and I completed
a Rundreisehoehle-204a surface survey started by Ollie and me
previously.
On the 25th we went caving, surveying the slide, Wet Dry World and
its link into [undecipherable word - Wtong's ?] Fortress. We derigged it
in record time, then taking a peer at "Gosser Streamway" and at "Wot No
Butcombe" before our return.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-25
Julia Bradshaw,
Base Camp - Walk from Base camp
I think it's called Tressenstein, will check in the morning with the
map. But if you're at Base Camp it's the hill you see (on the right) if
you look down the road (towards Bad Aussee) with the radio mast on top
(ungrammatical). Anyway, it's a nice walk with amazing views. If you
walk/cycle to the "Bad Aussee" town sign there are paths on the right,
you want path no. 19. The sign says 2 hours, it took me 1 1/2 hours
steady uphill (slowish compared to most) to the top. You can't really
see base camp or Grundlsee, but you do get utterly fantastic panoramic
views of Altaussee and Loser on one side and Bad Aussee on the other
side.
The path is signed. I took a couple of wrong turns but made it in the
end. Chickened out of climbing the mast but I bet you'd get a good view
of Grundlsee from there. If you're festering at base camp and 2 1/2 - 3
hours to spare walk up this hill!! It's rude not to! Seriously good
views, well worth the effort.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-25
Olly Betts, Jenny Black,
76 - The ledge in Plugged shaft
Went back down Plugged Shaft to The Ledge. I went in to the test
tubes to change the radon detector (incidentally the draught was back to
normal today). Olly heroically bolted across from the ledge on the
opposite side of the test tubes looking for my hypothesised continuation
the other side of Plugged Shaft. Sadly it didn't exist, which was a
great shame - it was just a big ledge in an alcove with an aven above.
Olly managed to reverse the climb/traverse removing the gear as he went
(I was very impressed!).
We exited the cave with Olly adding a deviation and switching two
hangers on the way. The drill started to go flat having done 17 holes
and been up the hill for ages.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-25
Nial Peters, Kathryn Hopkins, Edvin Deadman, Pete Harley,
204 - Convenience Series
Once again we returned to the Convenience Series hoping to find
further horizontal passage. Kathryn and I were first down and started by
bolting the short pitch down from "Now Wash Your Hands". When Pete and
Edvin turned up we sent them to investigate a QM back from the pitch
head. This turned out to connect into the cave we were about to push and
how now been named "Shit Chute".
Meanwhile Kathryn and I finished descending the pitch and found large
horizontal passages leading off. All of these ended in large pitches
which we did not have the rope to descend. One pitch was descended
entirely on naturals (and a deviation using the donkey's dick on the
tackle sack). This led to a large passage filled with boulders. It
rapidly became too steep to descend (and looked horrendous to rig
anyway).
I began to bolt another pitch but decided hand bolting it would take
too long. Instead we left the new passage (now named "Engaged") and
returned to "Out Of Order Rift" to look at a small QM "Urinal Cakes".
After ~30m of tight rift this led into a chamber with lots of vertical
leads heading off. The chamber, now called "Indecent Exposure", also had
one horizontal lead which we pushed for 20m until it ended in a small
chamber.
T/U: 14.0 hours
2007-07-25
Dave Loeffler, Djuke Veldhuis, Frank Tully,
Random leads in Insignificant
We felt like a short trip so went to try & tick off some annoying QMs
in the Insignificant area.
01-3C is clearly too tight.
01-7C went to a short crawl & climb up into a tall passage. This went
maybe 10m to a big pitch (probably Pleasuredome). Side passages high &
low on the right led to the same pitch.
A window just before the pitch was some more crawls & a steep ramp
down to a complex loopy junction. On the right is another big drop
(Pleasuredome again?). On the left various tubes lead off. QM C.
New passage is 'Swiss Cheese'.
At this point I gave up in disgust realising that my goal of making
the survey easier to draw was clearly hopeless, and we exited via No
Pain No Gain (modulo getting lost after turning left instead of right on
hitting 110 A Day).
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-25
Wookey, Nial Peters, Andrew Atkinson,
Trisselwand - the IVth
Niall felt it was time to attempt the trisselwand again, 15 years
after the last disastrous attempt. Wookey 'Volunteered' as a previous
incumbent, and Andrew was mugged into coming too. Packed in advance
with trepidation and got up by 6am to omelette already made by Andrew.
Hiked in to bottom from Sattel to start by 9am. To find the start go
down a bit (30m?) after the heli-landing zone open area & just follow
obvious path. We went off up wrong scree slope & wasted half an hour
faffing. First couple of hundred metres is just scrambling up path to
start.
We decided to do 'Hoferweg' route (5) as it is in guidebook with
topo. Previous trips have done the easier 'Stügerweg' route
(3-4+). Wook led 1st couple of pitches, getting a bit lost on 2nd.
Then Andrew took over for the next couple of pitches back into the
gulley. We whizzed up there, mostly moving together. Chilly in the
shade. Had lunch at 1pm above pitch 8. We were overtaken by 3 groups
further down - 2 heading up 'seeblick' sport route & one pair going
our way. They had no gear beyond extenders - using body belay or
italian hitch for belay!, but were clearly mch better climbers than
us. Soon we were at the headwall where there really is a bench fixed
in place to look at view from.
Next bit was obviously hard so we send niall first. Turned into
proper climbing at this point. 1st pitch (#12, 4-) OK, Next really
quite tricky - a fine lead. System we used was 2 half-ropes, leader
had no sack, both seconds carried rucksacks, on easy pitches both
seconds moved together. Pitch 14 was nasty-looking overhang - not as
bad as it looked but still scary & with desperate slab back into gulley,
not designed for short-arses (drop onto tiny ledge from one handhold.
wobbly piton for pro). more gulley & a couple of slabs, now quite hot
after 3½ hours in the sun. Andrew suffering from sun but saved by
cave at stance for pitch 18.
Now quite strung out with 2 hard pitches right at the top; tired,
hot. Having the hard stuff at the end like this is really rather
unhelpful. 2 more fine leads from Niall - bloody good job we brought
him along! nasty move out from cave, and marvellously exposed climb
round overhang looking right down 800m to lake, finally gets you off
horrible cliff to marvellous views that you could have had by walking
up.
very tedious 1&quarter;hrs trog back down to well-earned beer.
Niall liked the hard bits on good rock (& really didn't like the
chossy pitches). Wook and Andrew hated those and liked the easy bits
on shitty rock. Finished at 6:10pm.
9hrs on the rock. ~13hrs total trip.
Not epic, but bloody hard work & quite scary;
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-26
Olly Betts, Jenny Black,
Surface Prospecting - Surface shaft on Plateau
Walked down the hill via lots of places - put permanent tags on Lardy
Festerers and 250, calibrated the instruments at old TC [Top Camp]. Then
walked up to Mystery Plus [?not Plus?] cave. I went in and discovered it
choked less than a metre beyond where I had been without a light in
2006. Surveyed it and then surface survey down to a part-drilled spit
hole near the col. I hated the surface survey lots.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-27
Nial Peters, Mark Shinwell, Jon Telling,
Eishoehle
Photo trip to Eishoehle. Excellent cave, although I was very glad
that I wore my Buffalo jacket under my furry! Some good photos were
taken by Mark S, hopefully our sponsors will appreciate our efforts!
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-28
Andrew Atkinson, Andreas Forsberg, George North,
204 - Razor Dance -> Gobi Trail
We had meant to get underground before 9.00am, but unfortunately
Andreas and myself were feeling rather sleepy in the morning and so we
managed to get underground shortly after 11:00am. We had a smooth 4 and
a bit hour journey down to the pushing front, slowed down slightly by
Andrew A's enormous camera case (which was later left in 'The Silk
Road').
We commenced the surveying by re-doing a couple of the legs in 'The
Forbidden City' that had gone pear-shaped on the previous visit. We also
had had a quick look down some sandy crawls at the base of the chamber,
but they would all seem to offer only long term digging prospects. We
surveyed up the large loose passage at the top of the chamber for
approximately 100m. There is a climb there where care needs to be taken
not to slip! It appeared as though the passage was going to crap out,
but a low crawl led to a complex junction. We chose the RH passage as it
was heading towards KH, but the LH passage looked excellent too. A few
survey legs with good formations led us to a junction with a passage
with a very small trickle of water flowing down it, where we decided to
call it a day. Our highest point is now 118m above the sump level.
Another uneventful if tiring, journey out had us at the surface at
1.00am ish. Lots more question marks!
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-28
Olly Betts, Jenny Black,
Surface Prospecting - 81/82/85
Olly's guts weren't very happy so we picked an objective that would
never put us far from an entrance. We decided to survey 81 and 85 and
check for leads. We started with a quick look into 82 to look at the ice
stal and train tunnel passage. No ice this year at all and very little
snow. Train tunnel passage as impressive as ever, we noticed a
stooping/walking passage on the right which we followed (just a hole in
the floor and a lower passage) to the entrance of 83 - hurray, a
connection!
Also discovered another hole in the same doline as 85 which had
another 2 entrances (at least) and appears in the 81 doline. Surveyed 81
and looked for leads - the only one was a climb up an aven which turned
out to be an inlet only.
Surface surveyed 81 to 81b to 85 tags and went home - will complete
the other surveying soon. This is an interesting area with a phreatic
level not far from the surface. If some of it heads under the
Vord-Hinter ridge (like 82) it should be very cool.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-29
Djuke Veldhuis, Dave Loeffler, Nial Peters, Stuart Bennett,
Climbing
In preparation for climbing Trisselwant at some point (YIKES) the
four of us set off on a slightly cloudy and humid July morning. Via an
absolute fluke we got to the carpark we were aiming for: right
underneath the Burgstall (874m; take first right after avalanche tunnel)
just by Purg. So there we were, 4 numpties in sandals ... and then it
went wrong when we turned left half way up a via ferrata and then tried
right over an extremely shoddy path which was nicely exposed. Anyway we
got to a face about 5m wide with a "path" running across the front on
which you could fit 1 sandal at a time which made belaying really
fun;-)!
Whilst Nial set off on something with Dave L, Stuart climbed up a 4+
at a corner. well the climbing bit was fine until he took a lead fall,
his first. Climbers seem to talk things up, but after trying to also get
up this thing and failing, I too was convinced it must've been harder,
or at least more shiny than when it was first ascended. Stuart's lead
fall was interesting for me as well as I flew into some briers and
Stuart landed in a tree shortly followed by his ankle hitting the ground
at a dodgy angle which led to consistent "au"'s whilst walking.
So after the rubbish section that made us feel weak and feeble and
getting me more and more lethargic in hot, sticky, lethargic weather
myself and Stuart eventually toddled back down the dodgy "path" and
after aimlessly wandering for 1/2 hour or so we found 2 backpacks and 2
pairs of sandals underneath some staples. Nial and Dave were nowhere in
sight. It seemed sensible to have lunch and follow the staples up as we
didn't have the guide book and were sorely hoping they had chosen a
route we could actually climb rather than the tat we had seen
earlier.
As they say, up is the only way ... sure was as we soon realised we
were doing a superb multi-pitch route. Stuart started and soon we were
in a fairly smooth rhythm of alternating leading and seconding. Well,
"smooth" except for when we would realise (whilst leading) we were on
the middle of a slab of rock with no belay opportunities and no quick
draws left :-(. Loose boulders, wasps nests, falling rocks, crossing via
ferrataists and 2 very thirsty climbers we got to the top where Dave was
sitting, grinning, rock boots off having previously done mainly indoor
climbing.
We were exceptionally happy when it absolutely started rodding it
down ... not so much because it was raining but more so because it was
raining whilst we were NOT on the climbing route. Nial and Dave
had the highly intelligent idea of taking their rock boots off whilst
walking back to the car/bags which was fine until they go to the gravel
path down past a railway station (!). Crossing the railway tracks we
didn't have a dry piece of clothing left on our bodies ... indeed the
Austrian climbers sheltering under an overhang looked most bemused at
our antics. We decided to spare Tony R's car a bath and pretty much
stripped off before getting in (Dave L in his underpants, me driving
with a bra on, shirt off, etc). Despite our repeated offerings Dave L
rudely refused to let us drive straight to the station in Bad Aussee to
pick up his girlfriend who was arriving that same night.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-29
Jenny Black, Olly Betts,
148 - final trip
Decided it was time for a final trip in 148 to push the remaining
lead to a conclusion and derig. So we packed all the rope in the bivi
into a very full bag and set off.
We used a boulder and a spike as backups, then I climbed down the
rift, used another spike as a backup and stuck in a spit for the hang.
This got me down to where I'd been already via the alternate tight
thrutchy route. A rebelay off a thread reached the boulder-strewn
chamber floor. I followed the rift off the far side, round a corner to
the left, and it ended, far too tight. Shouted to Jenny that it was
over, then returning noticed a tight hold down into the rift, partly
hidden by the nose of a huge slab of fallen rock. A really strong icy
draught blasted up from it! Jenny sounded a little disappointed that it
wasn't really over.
A y-hang on spits and some awkward squirming reached a nicely
proportioned pitch. At the base, the floor was mostly clean-washed rock,
with a gravel bank to one side. The water flowed down a small hole, but
a climb up regained the rift. Round the corner to the left, the floor
dropped away. Stones rattle down the initial rift, then freefall for
perhaps 4 seconds (starting to whistle) then hit something solid, then
fell for another similar length of time. Hard to judge the total depth,
but a substantal pitch, and the 44m rope we had left wasn't going to
reach, so we surveyed out and planned to go back to base for more
rope.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-29
Mark Dougherty, Duncan Collis, Jon Telling, Ollie Stevens,
204 - Razordance -> Far East
Back down Razordance to take another look at the Far East. Uneventful
journey down. Jon took a look at the tubes at the bottom of the
Forbidden City. After ¬Ω hour working with a crowbar we decided that it
was a long-term job to dig through. We also looked downhill at the end
of the Silk Road. After descending a ~6m drop a shortish passage leads
to the top of a pitch. This is almost certainly the same pitch which can
be reached from below 'Carry on the Khyber' by following the water.
After that we continued along the phreatic passage above the Forbidden
City (the 'Gobi Trail') to the first major junction. Left here was
unsurveyed so we surveyed in, clocking up ~100m of new passage to a
point where a vadose canyon intersected. Right (up) led to a 6m aven,
reasonably climbable with some gear. Left led, via a climb down, to a
continuing rift which heads towards the left zipper/right zipper area in
Razordance. The phreas clearly continues over the top of the vadose
canyon but would require some effort to reach it. Finally we tidied up a
few minor leads. Closing a loop which led back to the Gobi Trail at the
climb (where we had previously rigged a hand line). Then out. A long
hard struggle back up Razordance and all of us ran out of puff in the
Ariston series. Ollie got slightly lost at Wolpertinger Way, but it was
his first trip in the cave. Given that he has only been caving a year
this trip was a major step up for him and all the rest of us thought he
did BLOODY WELL. We can expect HARD BASTARD exploits from this chap in
the future. Hats off!
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-29
Wookey, Julian Todd, John Billings, Becka Lawson,
Via Ferrata - Loser Klettersteig
A fine diversion as a warm-up for our carry-up to Top Camp. Checked
out the cave at the base - graffiti dating back to 1800's - and the very
small (5m) cave on the left at the start of the escape route - doesn't
go.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-30
Jenny Black,
76 - Radon Detector change
Nipped into 76 to change radon detectors. All the rain was easting at
the larger remaining snow plug which made me a little nervous but I
figured it would last a bit longer so continued. I hope it goes when I
am not nearby ... changed detectors and came out - reversed pulsing
draught today.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-30
Wookey, Julian Todd, Andrew Atkinson, Becka Lawson,
204 - Gaffered -> The Wares -> Software
Bimbled down Gaffered, all looking very familiar. Before that, had to
scrounge rope from the pitch into On A Mission and a bag from the top of
Gosser Streamway as there was all of 1.8m of rope left at Top Camp.
Rigged from Gardener's World down and then up into the Wares. Andrew
slung a rope down QM 04-23C and reported it as short passage to ~8m
pitch (QM B) then we went into Software and continued QM 05-73A. Wookey
put in a marginal-to-the-point-of-scary rig on small naturals down ~10m
to a small chamber. He and Julian surveyed a Quaking-esque tube,
drafting slightly, heading down, leaving it as a tight QM C with sound
of water. Andrew and I headed left, back parallel to the main Wares
passage in gradually smaller passage down to a flat-out wriggle but then
it headed up steeply and into a small chamber. Left here probably linked
back to near the start of the Wares passage. Right was a steeply
descending rift, QM B. Unfortunately the strong draft coming out of
Software that had drawn me back there seems to come from the roof rubes
above the pitch. Uneventful trundle out, taking out all the rope we'd
brought in. Oh yes - had Phil's Pony to survey with and its the bee's
knees.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-30
Pete Harley, Jon Telling, Nial Peters, Sarah White, Frank Tully,
Fucking about in the Quarries (?)
(Maybe others not listed)
Some of the people at top camp decided that caving was effort. They
were right. Therefore we decided to look at some hole we had walked past
on a previous slack day showing newcomers where Tunnocks is.
We passed 204 E to find some reasonably deep but snow filled holes.
Armed with a drill Nial bolted our way down a hole. Our team (Nial, Pete
and Sarah) was joined by Jon after Pete had descended and decided we
didn't have enough rope. Aided by Jon what we decided was 2007.03 was
descended to a snow plug and a slot followed by Jon. We surveyed down
the slot to a choke. It turns out this place was probably already
explored in 2002. Frank laddered down a hole that had a vital connection
to where we had been. Sarah and I looked [continued 3 pages later:
'Quarries continued'] in another hole that had a bolt already in place
and found no leads. Sarah + Jon looked at some other places further in
the Tunnocks direction which one of them will have to write about. To
conclude: Time wasted - 1 day.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-31
Mark Dougherty, Phil Underwood, George North,
Surface Prospecting - Surface walk and radon detector collection
Walked over to 161d. Mark and Phil went in to collect radon detector
from the Guillotine. We then picked our way down to the Stogerweg. On
the way down we found a promising looking entrance. Unfortunately Mark
found that it was a ~30m long through-trip! Going back along the path we
made a detour to Schnellzuhoehle. Mark and George went in and collected
another radon detector. After that a return to the carpark and down to
the Loserhutte with Djuke, Tony and Emma for a meal and beer.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-31
Dave Loeffler, , *Sarah Z
Via Ferrata
Sarah and I thought we'd try the Loser via ferrata. Nobody died
(almost though). The end. [Sarah writes:] But I enjoyed the last part.
Sarah.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-07-31
Wookey, Julian Todd, Andrew Atkinson, Becka Lawson,
204 - Razordance -> push horizontal leads. Combined push, survey, photo + derig trip. Sigh.
Woken up by Andrew to the news that we were going down Razordance.
Hmm, really? I was prussiking out of 204E at 10pm last night + fancied a
bit of a mellow, shallow shufty. Still, now or never as the derig loomed
+ Wookey was keen. Then Julian astounded us all by muttering that he'd
come along. He went off for a dump whilst we consulted Andrew who was
going to have to shepherd us down there. Why not? says Andrew, so we
were underground by 10am feeling a bit old, unfit + generally fragile
for all of this lark. Slowly down the pitches then into the rift. And
more rift. And more sodding rift, ye gods. Only Andrew had been through
before (+ then only once) so we got lost a couple of times, particularly
trying to find the oxbow thing but finally we hit the sump + the
unfeasible traverse. Don't worry, its easier this direction says Andrew.
Hmm, reassuring. Quick chocky stop + off up lots of scrambly climbs -
not too bad but it felt a long way from home by now. What's all this
about? asks Wookey. We have to go up 120m now says Andrew. Bloody hell.
Wish we'd looked at the survey a bit more carefully before setting off -
except that would probably have discouraged us from all this nonsense.
This is wasting my valuable getting-out energy grumbles Julian. Picked
up Andrew's camera case + did some 4-flash shots in the big chamber then
split with Andrew + Julian taking photos and Wookey + I continuing
Andrew, George + Andreas' Gobi Trail survey ~ SW for 130m including
plenty of diddly 2m legs in mainly crawly / stoopy tubes with sand or
pebble floor. A reasonable draft heading in with us. It was all quite
cosy + friendly and we could easily have notched up a few more hours
surveying but Wookey decided that enough was enough so we took some
cheesy group shots + left things at a complex junction wuth 2 QM A's and
a QM B with sound of water. One to a Razordance-like rift with water,
the other with a strong draft coming out + heading up steeply. Derigged
the hand line + I picked up the tacklesack of unrigged rope + back to
the sump to put on our SRT gear. I failed to palm off the tacklesack on
anyone + set off to the start of the traverse. I'd heard Dunks muttering
that cutting the rope for the traverse without leaving a tail down to
the sump level had been a bit overkeen on scrimping with the rope + the
muddy slope from the end of the traverse down had been awkward on the
way there but, hey, nobody had actually fallen off it yet. Andrew had
mentioned it was easier high but with the tacklesack I didn't want to
slither a long way down so I gingerly teetered forward on muddy ledges +
eyed up the slot in the sump, wondering if it was narrow enough that I
couldn't possibly fall down it. Yes I thought + promptly my foot slid +
I decided to check it out. 'Shit'. Then I've got one foot under the
water + the other braced on the far wall with the tacklesack dangling
like a Mafioso's cement sack from my waist + some serious knee shake.
'Andrew's coming' shouts Wookey. He gets his long cows tail into the
traverse + I manage to clip my cow's tail into his footloops + then do a
flailing prussik up him and onto the traverse. Still nobody
volunteered to take the fucking tacklesack. I hauled myself across the
traverse trying to maintain enough stress that my 8pm spit sample on the
far side was a good 'un. Right, that was my low point, literally as well
as figuratively. Andrew derigged the traverse whilst collecting his spit
+ gobs as soon as he gets over. Were you holding the spit pot whilst you
derigged? asked Wookey. Er, he's good but even Andrew probably didn't
have a spare hand there. Tootled up the rift - not as bad as feared,
route-finding easier than on the way down + it didn't seem any more
energetic than on the way down, especially as all the pitches are nice +
bite sized. I didn't let anyone have a cup-of-soup at the camp as we
didn't deserve it. On + on, I'd forgotten all the pitches by now. I
managed to do an awkward section right at the bottom whilst everyone
else wandered around trying to find the way higher up. Then a really
long pitch, followed by another largish one. I got a bit concerned as
Julian would be slow on this + I knew Razordance started with an awkward
section + a couple of short pitches so we must still have quite a long
way to go in the rift... Andrew came up swearing at his dysfunctional
jammer. How many more pitches? I asked. 12. OK altogether, but how many
to go? Well, we've done 1 or 2. No, but the first ones in Razordance are
short... ah! You mean I'm not in the rift any more??? Great news -
halfway up Kiwi Suit before I knew it. No time out from here. Andrew + I
got out + rehydrated, went to bed + Julian + Wookey came out a couple of
hours later. Julian did an ad hoc spit sample just to see what euphoria
hormones look like (though how he gets his 4am baseline comparison I
don't know). A fine trip - once in a lifetime, literally, for Julian at
least... Combined age of 4 team members = 152 years, what's the
retirement age for this kind of nonsense?
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-01
Andrew Atkinson, Becka Lawson,
Surface Prospecting - Prospecting from 204
Andrew and I decided to get a bit of gentle exercise so did a walk
towards 161d/g and found not v. many promising holes for quite a lot of
stomping.
1 2007-03 Elev 1747m 36970 82767 Horizontal entrance to ~3m pitch,
slight draft out. Not very promising.
2 2007-04 Elev 1750m 37017 828845 Low, wide entrance at base of 3m
cliff - a dig!
3 2007-05 Elev 1758m 37070 82945 5m deep surface hole with two
horizontal entrances at either end. The most likely-looking lead
probably.
4 2007-06 Elev 1810m 36931 83264 20m deep surface shaft - possible
way off from base, to SE.
5 2007-07 Elev 1873m 36916 83559. Horizontal tube sloping down, ends
after 10m, no draft.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-01
Nial Peters, Pete Harley, Sarah White,
204 - Overnight pushing trip to Convenience Series
Despite getting up at a reasonable time, lots of faffing (mostly by
Pete) meant we didn't get underground till after midday. There was a
serious lack of enthusiasm as we crawled through Germknoedel's Revenge.
I had knackered my knee on the previous day's walk up the hill and the
trip got off to a slow start as I limped my way down Treeumphant.
Eventually we arrived at Engaged in the Convenience series and began to
feel a bit more enthused about the trip. Unfortunately, Pete had taken a
wrong turn and had dragged the heavy bag of rope down Out of Order rift
- silly bugger! By the time he arrived I had put in the bolts for a
Y-hang at the top of the pitch series we were planning to rig. I was
extremely pleased to find that the power drill we had dragged down there
worked perfectly. Four rebelays later and I found myself at the bottom
of a very drippy and cold shafter. It didn't go anywhere, but did have
two sumps at the bottom. Unfortunately it turned out that me power
bolting is considerably faster than Pete and Sarah surveying (despite
the fact that they had a Pony and a disto!) so I had to sit and freeze
for 1 1/2 hours at the bottom while they caught up. When they finally
arrived they were hypothermic too and had failed to finish surveying the
shaft. I set off back up the ropes and left them to finish their survey
and derig. This took much longer than expected since Pete had forgotten
his spanner and in an attempt to give him hers, Sarah dropped it down
the pitch! Pete managed tot derig most of it using a maillon but in the
end I had to abseil back down to the first rebelay and give him my
spanner. Having been sat at the top of the pitch for over two hours,
Sarah and I were once again hypothermic so set off out as soon as Pete
arrived.
We stopped briefly in Dead Good Bat chamber for soup, but due to the
passing of time we were starting t come close to our 9am callout so we
didn't stop for long. At the bottom of Cerberus I left the other two
(and my tackle sack) in order to get out in time for our callout and
extend it for the others. I was extremely glad of Wookey's double
strength Ibuprofen which made prussiking with my dodgy knee bearable. I
surfaced at 7am and Sarah and Pete emerged at 11am. A ridiculously long
trip considering the amount of progress we had made.
Things that went wrong:
- had to derig Dave and Djuke's rope - which got stuck
- Sarah lost her foot jammer
- Sarah's chest tape broke
- My foot jammer broke
- We all got freezing
- Pete didn't have a spanner and Sarah dropped hers
All in all a great trip :-)
Pitch series is now called S.L.T.R. for reasons known only to its surveyors.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-01
Jenny Black, Olly Betts,
Surface Shaft
Having failed to find 2004-04 the previous afternoon we had another
go and it was still hidden sadly. Then went to look for 84 which we also
failed to find, I guess it is either well hidden or not close to 83 to
the WNW.
Found an interesting looking hole (2007-73) walking entrance down a
snow slope which then went down a bit to a chamber. Olly looked at the
continuation which was a bit snowy & small. We will return later in
expo.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-02
Olly Betts, Jenny Black,
82 - 82-85
Went over to survey the connection with 85. Shortly into the
connection is an aven up to the surface a new higher entrance! As we
surveyed we could hear very loudly a thunderstorm overhead, and a
waterfall appeared near the 85 entrance. Olly had a look at the
continuation of 85 but thought the climb wasn't freeclimbable due to the
current snowline position.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-03
John Billings, Aaron Curtis, Jon Telling,
204 - John Billing's account of Razor Dance derigging trip
(+ Duncan Collis, Mark Dougherty, Richard Mundy + George North) -
which somehow have to fit into this schema
Left basecamp for an 'early start' at (maybe) 10am. (Duncan + Mark
had been talking about a R.D. trip the day before...) Got to Stone
Bridge early afternoon. JonT was itching for a RD derigging trip -
already up there for a few days, wanted a 'decent' trip. Aaron + I
pulled on our gear quickly, & then the three of us set off down 204A...
Duncan & Mark to follow after a few hours.
My second trip in Austria, first one was with Aaron to do some
science stuff in a shallow cave. This RD trip turned out to be quite
vertical. Not much horizontal caving, at least to start with. Stopped
briefly for my 2pm spit sample. We carried on downwards (later learnt
that this was the Kiwi series).
After a couple of hours we hit Razor Dance. Much more horizontal &
quite tight. Had a few problems finding the correct level - it's quite a
deep vertical rift in a few/most places. Lots of grunting. JonT: 'flow
with the rock, not against it'.
Got to final pitch before sump at bottom. Jon + Aaron already down.
Just as I was half-way down, Jon shouts for me to start going back up.
What the fuck? Shouts that it's getting very wet. Bloody hell, he's got
a point, this little RD stream has got a lot wetter. Better had
get out. Oops, no chest jammer on central MR (in dangly bag) - have to
go right down. Thunderstorm?
Put chest jammer on. Jon volunteers to derig - yes please! Start
heading out, followed by Aaron then Jon. Bottom pitches very wet - get
quite soaked. After a while, bump into Duncan & Mark. Good to see them.
Say they've re-rigged Paster of Muppets pitch 'cause it's a bit damp.
Follow Duncan up to top of Pepper Pot. Duncan, Mark & I wait there for
an hour (damn cold!) until Aaron & Jon turn up. Given heavy
tacklesack full of wet rope, carry on pushing up through RD. Duncan goes
on ahead.
Turns out that it's quite a mission to push a tackle sack through
tight, vertical rift. Almost leave it a couple of times. Arms tired.
Actually, there is a technique to it. Push it ahead and wedge it,
then follow.
Got to basic 'camp' (stove + food) called 'God Loves a Drunk' [GLAD
in other write-ups] - passed straight through on way down. Hot food,
courtesy of Duncan. Richard & George also there! Set off again after a
bit, following Jon. Hear him now & then at top of pitches.
Leave tacklesack at bottom of Kiwi Suit next to Jon's. Start up,
bloody hard work. See Duncan following at the bottom of pitches. Should
have brought more chocolate bars. Find my discarded water bottle on way
up - very thirsty, quite welcome! Also a flap-jack cache :)
Eventually got to the surface at 2am. 'Job's a good 'un'. Food then
sleep. Won't do that again in a hurry. Appears there was a ~7pm
thunderstorm.
Finis.
T/U John+Jon+Aaron 12hrs
Duncan + MarkD: 11hrs
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-03
Wookey, Andrew Atkinson, Becka Lawson, Ollie Stevens,
204 - Razordance Finish derigging
Down 10am. Wookey + I fetched the tackle sack of rope from Mystery
Wind + derigged the two pitches. By the time we were back at the bottom
of Kiwi Suit Andrew had unbagged all the rope and done paella number one
(and two) up the first pitch by himself... at which point we were
committed... to 9 more paella stacks until the last one emerged onto the
slabs outside of Top Camp. Ollie came along to help when we were on the
big pitch below Wolpertinger Way, which made life easier (down to only
one tackle bag each) and on the final pull we had an excellent surface
support party of Aaron, Richard, John + Jon to do all the hard work.
Rope dried overnight, coiled the next day so all the RD derigged in 2.5
trips - not bad.
T/U Wookey, Andrew + Becka: 11 hrs
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-03
Jenny Black, Olly Betts,
76: Boiling Tubes
It had rained a lot overnight + was still raining so decided the
pitch in 148 might be unpleasant, so decided on 76 instead. Went to the
end of the Boiling Tubes where we left 3 leads in 2004. None of the
leads looked great, but we started with 04-62B, the straight-on lead.
This was crawling then wiggling to a boulder which was followed shortly
by a stal blockage - unusual for Austria. The stals weren't huge, but
neither was the passage. I surveyed back while Olly took notes, and
sadly my promising lead heading straight for 2007-71 was no more. (There
was a small red spider there).
Olly removed some soil from the RH lead 04-63C and discovered that
the soil continued for quite some way, so we left off that and looked at
the final crap lead (04-04C). After moving some rocks I crawled down,
slightly downhill and over rocks. I was really hoping that I would be
able to turn around at some point as I wasn't looking forward to
reversing back.
Then I noticed the passage was echoing. In my experience so far,
small crawls tend not to make large echos. This made me excited and
optimistic that I might be able to turn round. After a few more metres
the crawl enlarged enough that I could just turn round, yay! Rocks
dropped down the pitch went for ~2.5s then bounced a bit more. Shame it
would be a crap place to carry gear.
Returned to BNW and looked at 04-25C, surveyed down to
where it got small - is very easy to move rocks though. It looks like it
connects with Loopy so probably easier to get through from the
south.
Finally looked at 04-26B, scramble in (easily) [something] - the A+
pitch ledges into a narrow walking height passage followed this up to a
T junction, left is low crawling and right a bit larger - both are C
grade leads. The RH one may join 04-41C perhaps. Surveyed this and left,
removing the radon detectors on route.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-03
Richard Mundy,
BS17 - 'Quest to BS17'
The previous night I had been down to 'God Loves A Drunk' with George
North. On the 3rd I therefore hurt and my caving gear was thoroughly
soaked through. Given no sun to dry it, a day of top camp festering
ensued. I erased the memories of prussiking through 2 deg C Razordance
waterfalls ("the wettest I have ever seen it" - Mark D) by going on a
mission for Dave L; a quest to BS17.
BS17 is about a 1h10 walk away, with no heavy pack in ordinary
clothes. One travels over the ridge behind the bivvy and over two
subsequent hills, before coming across a fairly low ridge, perhaps 500m
long and running E-W. On the far (North) side of the ridge, the
limestone takes the form of a series of 5m cliffs up the slope.
Organhoehle, BS17, is likely to be one of the many holes in these
cliffs. The GPS point did not correspond to one exactly, but there were
half a dozen possibilities within 50m. The area around the ridge appears
very promising for caves. The limestone is not very broken-up and there
are holes, big & small, everywhere. The side of the ridge is
particularity nice in that it offers many horizontal entrances.
I took my photographs using Ollie S's camera before stumbling back in
thick fog, hoping the GPS did not pack-up.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-03
Richard Mundy,
Top Camp - VERMIN
Top Camp is now home to:
-30 massively fat and well fed insulted mice.
-THE FLAPJACK BEAST
Frank has scored a victory over the mice by altering the food
hammock, rendering it inaccessible to them.
However, we saw THE FLAPJACK BEAST (a small squirrel thingy) access
the hammocks via running upside down across the Stone Bridge roof. This
animal will thus prove hard to defeat.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-04
John Billings, Becka Lawson,
Tunnocks - Rigging Tunnockschacht
Neither of us had been before but the magic of GPS and a good set of
cairns got us to the entrance. John then whinged all the way down the
entrance pitch about rubs. I just thought he was seeing some standard
CUCC rigging but as I went down it went rub, twang, rub along with a
hail of loose rocks. On the way out we realized that some of the problem
were that the snow level was way down on last year‚ but we'd also not
been warned about the three rope protectors needed. After that comes a
small sloping crawl. Should I take the tacklesack? Asks John. No, it's
OK if you just roll it ahead says I. Oh no - you OK? Er, do you want to
go check out this QMC down this little shaft? Fortunately John could get
down & reported it kept going as a QM B‚ and fetched the tacklesack. We
then looked at 06-19A which looked an excellent lead. After some
gardening there was no time left to survey so nosed around the rest of
the passage there and then out. Be a lovely cave if someone with a drill
rigged the entrance more creatively.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-04
Olly Betts, Jenny Black,
81 - new stuff
Went back to 81 to survey the new stuff. Not a hugely long cave but a
lot of entrances (which we have put hiltis in for the tags and for 82b
tag). There are still a couple of leads to look at later as well. What
we surveyed was mostly walking passage and quite pleasant.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-04
Ollie Stevens, Aaron Curtis, Richard Mundy,
204 - 'Lead 03-75A'
My caving gear still wet & cold, we set off to the 'Wot no Butcombe'
end of the 'Rhino Rift' area of 204. We rigged pitch 03-79A; a phreatic
pitch wead [sic] tackled nicely with a single backed-up bolt. The
fortuitous bolt placement occured purely by chance.
03-76B leads out from the opposite side of the pitch head, but would
require a handful of bolts to access. Aaron took some time rigging, at
one point succeeding in incorporating his chest tape into the rig
accidentally. We descended the pitch, now named 'Hollow Sausage.' It is
phreatic in character, with a shelf around halfway down before the shaft
balloons out, then contracts again.
At the bottom of this 9m pitch, one finds one's body in a small
widening of a tall, narrow, and windy rift. This had a small stream at
the bottom and had been named "Dover's Last Stand". The crawl to the
pitchhead is likewise rocky.
A boulder choke prevents one travelling far downhill the rift. Uphill
there are fine mud formations on the left wall. A 4m climb leads to a
narrowing of the rift. It gets too tight, but there seems to be a route
above of B/C QM calibre. This is tough and may qualify as being a pitch.
Would be better explored downhill.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-04
Wookey, Andrew Atkinson, John Billings,
204 - Gösser Streamway - Rig push, survey, derig
Needed an easy trip in order to walk down hill for Trisselwand, so
picked a QM on the survey which was interestingly above the huge aven in
Hippocratic Oath. QM 06-7A at the end of Goesser Streamway. Also took in
a rope to replace 1996 traverse line in Cave Tree Chamber (9mm bit of
2006 red stuff ~15m).
Discovered that top of line was tied to 2 large but loose boulders.
One moved 3 feet with a slight touch! Took opportunity to get rare
photos of large falling boulder. 2nd shot (boulder) was great. Put in 2
bolts to make it safe, using opportunity to teach John B how to put in
drill bolts.
Rigged down - cave is not quite like survey. Actually p3 & p6 after
~4m and then ~p8 after ~12m then ~30m of streamway to final p29. Got to
end to find [?bury] bolt on far side of pitch but no back-up bolts /
threads / anything. Someone had been very necky. Put in 2 bolts for
traverse to pitch (drills are great) and dropped to bottom. Nice winding
passage sadly went nowhere: solid rock at one end, deepish (0.6m) pool
and impenetrable rift [?inuing king] stream, at the other end. Surveyed
(2 legs, ~38m) and derigged and went home with big fat bag of rope.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-05
Ollie Stevens, Aaron Curtis, Richard Mundy,
204 - Chocolate Salty Balls
Ollie, Aaron and I went for a 2.5 hour jaunt down 204e. The main
purpose was to place some thermistors in Chocolate Salty Balls for
Aaron.
Meanwhile, Ollie and I looked at some QMs 01-39 C should be
downgraded to a D lead. It seems to be boulder choked.
The nearby B lead, if it corresponds to the hole in the floor, looks
really very tight and very steep.
01-36C was pushed. It turns right, then becomes too tight.
It is worth noting that Andrew 'Andy' Atkinson and co have replaced
the handline in Cave tree chamber with some red 2006 9mm. I would have
put in some 2003 myself, but don't ultimately care.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-05
Ollie Stevens, Richard Mundy, Aaron Curtis,
204 - CSB Thermistor & Treeumphant
With one datalogger installed in Germkndel's Revenge already
(upcoming writeup), we set off to install 3 more: 2 in chocolate salty
balls (1 hobo(?) with 4 thermistors, 2 wet/dry pairs, 1 easysense with
temp, RH, and barometric pressure) and 1 in crowning glory.
[diagram of where stuff is]
Also ticked off QMs 01-40C and 0139C.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-06
Jon Telling, Becka Lawson, Morven,
258 - Tunnocks -> Apfel Strudel
My first ever cave in Austria, descended down very loose boulder
slopes to large pile of snow at bottom of pitches, fun sledging down.
First ever injury in Austria soon followed, jumping to avoid boulder
fall and landed on lovely smooth icy floor, same effect as banana skin!
A fun but painful trip followed. Found Apfelstrudel section of cave;
best bit was a chute that looked like a bob sleigh run, great going
down, tricky on the way out. Ended survey at exciting junction, pitch on
one side, stomping passage on the other. Back up pitches & down to top
camp for introduction to Holy Hand Grenade [Hungarian-donated alcoholic
beverage].
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-06
Olly Betts, Jenny Black,
81 - crap lead
Went to 81 for an easy day to tick off the crap lead near the RH
route from 81b. To me it looked like a tight, loose & awkward route
through a boulder choke that obviously didn't go. Only went in cos Olly
thought it was "interesting". Having moved the loosest rocks out of the
way I wriggled through and it opened up into a rift. The boulders looked
less bad from below, so Olly came through as well. Got into a rift with
various holes in the floor to a lower passage in the same rift. I
traversed right to the end to where it was easy to climb down. This got
us down to the top of a lot of ice which formed a floor to the rift
chamber.
Walked carefully around on the ice we saw some cool curved ice
formations. At the end of the ice there appeared to be a pitch down
between the ice and rock. We were without gear so steered clear, but
hypothesized it might drop into the ice castle passage in 148. Surveyed
out (checking that the outer lead didn't do anything interesting)..
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-07
Dave Loeffler, , *2 guys from Reading Uni
Dachstein Via Ferrata
Did the Seemond - Klettersteig. No helicopter involved. Takes about
5 hrs on the face and hours walk either end and cable car down. Bloody
hard work but magnificent situations.
NB This is not the same as the Johann-Klettersteig. It is about the
same grade but 780m long while Johann is about 500m. Starts from the
Kessel spring near Hallstalt, and goes to Gjoid Alm.
FWIW If you are going to do this you must leave early - sun will hit
you at 2pm ish, and last cable car down is 5pm.
TW (Time wired) 5hrs
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-07
Wookey, John Billings,
2007-04 - Walk to 204 via 161d
Given light rucksacks and a nice day decided to investigate doing 161
from 204 and thus check out the practicality of route. Walked to 161d
without much faffing. Decided to have a tourist in cags and headtorches
and to show John fine passage off triassic park. Nice trip for about 50
mins, including some photos.
Then continued along traverse to 161 e and f. Found a large entrance
sloping in, untagged and unmarked. Assumed it was 161e but later
research showed that it was further north than 161f which we came across
a few mins later. The entrance must be known? Later marked bivi site
cave list to say 161e is not tagged/marked, but seems that is confusion
not fact.
Continued following traverse which was generally easy to follow. Bit
of bunde cutting would make it lovely. Got out from below cliff after
45 mins but then got into complex area of shelves. Not sure best route
to take as we had no GPS. Ridge looks completely different from the
back side. Very hard to tell which peak is which and a hole load of
extra peaks appear. ridge is not really a ridge at all and is about 500m
wide. Eventually struck due west and came out 300m North of the
bivi.
Found a couple of caves en-route. 1st explored enthusiastically by
John B despite not being good in Tshirts and shorts (low, crawly).
Slight draft. Unfortunately due to no GPS we won't find it again for
years.
Also found large hole 200m from bivi, described in 'slippery hole'
entry.
With all the aving and sub-optimal walk whole walk from car park took
about 5 1/2 hrs. From 161d it is probably about 2hrs to 204 by sensible
route. 1 1/2 to nearer entrance. Route needs some serious honing to
make practical for trips, but we confirmed that cliff traverse part is
not a problem (in fact its the nicest bit).
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-07
Ollie Stevens, Aaron Curtis,
Anemometer related quick useless trip
After a few hours of fiddling with his homel(?) new sonic anemometer
using a picoscope and laptop at the bridge, Aaron threw up his hands and
decided to solder the finicky thing into a datalogger and whack it to
the bottom of E entrance. The allen key needed to open the logger was
conveniently in a peli case in chocolate salty balls. While Aaron was
already resigned to bringing laptop and scope underground because
anemometer needed to be adjusted after export, trying to solder
underground seemed like crossing the line. So Aaron went down to get key
and brought a well-calibrated Ollie to put in a spit to mount the
anemometer on. On the surface again, Aaron failed to get the logger and
anemometer to play nice together and decided to abandon the enterprise
until a later date, in the UK or on Expo08.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-07
Nial Peters, Andrew Atkinson, Martin Green, Becka Lawson,
204 - Gaffered -> Inconvenience Series
Down to tick off some leads & start the derig. Nial rigged his "worst
ever pitch" - for his sake, I hope it is true - rope slung round a
boulder at the pitch head, past a wriggle through loose choss and a few
rub points and down to a spit he put in with a 20cm long vertical crack
above it. This dropped us down to where the Engaged pitch landed and
from there Martin attempted to outdo Nial by rigging the next pitch on
even more choss. Got very cold waiting and I was mighty relieved to
find, after the first spit had gone in, that we'd run out of hangers (we
accidentally only had brought two in total!) & could go out. Andrew took
a few photos through the trip and he and I surveyed two shortish QM's
whilst Nial and Martin headed out. We then derigged the rope in
Convenience and Chalk & Cheese and then I took a tacklesack out leaving
just a 55m pushing rope to fish out at the bottom of Gaffered. Overtook
Martin and Nial before Gaffered and slowly we all trundled out.
Super-muddy Gaffered rope plus a heavy tacklesack is a crap
combination.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-07
Olly Betts, Jenny Black,
1987-02 - Surface and Shaft
Walked up to Laser 0/5 and had a look for 1987-02. Scrambled up the
hill for a way and didn't see any horizontal entrances. Got fairly near
the crest of the ridge, so headed back down by a different route. Olly
spotted a draughting out shaft which we numbered 2007-7[MISSING],
GPS[MISSING]. Carried on down and got to a hidden valley with a low
horizontal entrance with a HUGE out draft. Walked inside and got some
big passage going straight on and right, both of which led to pitches.
Reading the old logbook suggests this must be 1987-02 (from the U/G and
entrance location descriptions).
Surface surveyed this to Laser 0/5/
Oh, in the morning had a look at another new entrance (that has
probably been seen before). Collapsed valley entrance with a couple of
leads, one might go but not without an oversuit & kneepads. Second lead
is a crawling / stooping phreatic passage for ~10m till it chokes. This
is 2007-7[MISSING] GPS[MISSING]
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-07
Jenny Black, Olly Betts,
81 - 81-148 connection
Olly looked down the surface shaft near 148 first - down to the snow
plug then the ledge to where a narrow rift heads down presumably into
the aven in 148. Didn't push down this yet as we have the other route
rigged.
We were going to push the pitch shaft in 148 but I was feeling sick
so we went back to 81 to tie up a surveying loose end. Olly concocted a
plan whereby I sat at the entrance and felt ill, and Olly went down the
rift shaft and bolted the hypothesized 148 connection. I figured he
would have a hard time with the rope, drill & survey left on his own
through the rift & climbs, so I came too & felt ill & whinged a lot.
Olly bolted down the pitch at the end of the ice and sadly it didn't go
far. We surveyed it and while I derigged Olly looked for other pitches
we had missed.
Back at the other end a tight grovel through ice led to a small rift
and a pitch. This dropped into 148! Right where we built a cairn which
was cool. Surveyed out passing Nial & Andrew photoing ice and
raisins.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-08
Richard Mundy,
2007-04 - 'Slippery Hole'
The previous day, we walked to 2007-04 with Wookey. On the 8th we
pushed and surveyed this. The cave is in a loose depression on the ridge
behind the bivi. It has plenty of snow in the entrances and dramatic
slabs of rock hovering above it.
The north entrance leads to 'Slackwell's Stumble', a boulder choked
passage with bouldery floor.
The other entrance leads to a snowy slide down into ' John's Winter
Wonderland' or alternatively a precarious 3m climb leading to a boring
chamber or a bouldery passage into 'Quick wee chamber', with a ledge on
the opposite side.
Quick wee has a high entrance inaccessible to us. John's winter
wonderland has a too tight passage that echoes and feels as if it may
'go' under the snow.
2007-04 has been tagged by us as such.
We had several 'brown alert' moments on climbs, due to slipperiness
and looseness. Another memorable time was when I put in a crap spit,
then reached to hang a sling from a natural. The snow under me
collapsed, dropping me 4m. Luckily onto more snow. I slid down the
snow towards the Winter Wonderland, before the rope became taut and
caught me. Worrying.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-08
Wookey, Becka Lawson, Andrew Atkinson,
Photo, Rig, survey, push in Tunnocks
Andrew took photo gear, Wook took tackle & rigging gear, Becka
took survey gear. Went in to far end to rig traverse over '17s rattle,'
via a couple of metres of entrance ice.
Andrew rigged traverse and we threw lots of big rocks, reckoning main
pitch to be 45m with prob another similar below. Traverse just led to
other views down pitches. Not clear if all three holes are same pitch or
not. Put in a couple more spits to tidy rig, surveyed & went back to
lead below climb up to cobble pile. Pitch down but c3 into passage went
about 50m to another large pitch.
Big draught.
Next went to horizontal QM N of cobble pile. This was nice &
flat. Andrew left for 2nd photo trip of day in 82. Becka & Wookey
surveyed over 250m of stonking passage "Rhubarb Crumbly". Exceptionally
fine trip - lots of QM's. Eventually gave up, utterly sated by too many
QMs - chamber with two going off E, NE, NW.
Laser surveying is the way forward -- but keep batts away from SAP.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-08
Frank Tully, Aaron Curtis, Ollie Stevens, Pete Harley,
Tunnocks - Tunnockschacht
Got underground 1pm with intention to head south. After ticking off
06-11C and 06-20C, realized our progress was cut short without any rope
to descend the p9. Aaron set off to find Andy, Wook & Becka in South
Tunnocks to swipe some rope. Find them he did, and returned with more
than he bargained for - Big Bertha complete with drill, misc gear &
rope. After much to-ing and fro-ing S to N, following objectives
accomplished: Surveyed & derigged 2 pitches Duncan had dropped in N off
of big chamber (now called 'Secret Squirrel' and 'Fat Rat'). Frank &
Pete left to go down hill at this point. Ollie & Aaron rigged p9 in
Sauerkraut; could only find one spit in wall & no naturals, so put
another in as considered this a tad dodgy. Dropped 06-31A, to be
surveyed next trip. Has another pitch and horizontal QMB at bottom &
provisionally called the 'Pantin Sales Pitch.' Also bolted pitch into
big chamber in N [traverse into Caramel Catharsis] (where Secret
Squirrel begins) which had hung off impressive natural but was awkward
to mount / dismount, now much better. Pete and Frank out ~7pm? Aaron and
Ollie out 12pm.
T/U 7h Pete, Frank
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-08
Jon Telling, Morven, Martin Green,
Surface - shafts
Went to surface shaft Frank & I found a few days ago - a phreatic
tube ending in a big bowl of choss, above quarries uphill of bivvy site.
[Voed?] ladder & lifeline to survey, only small, loose cave, [blasted?].
Boulders, ah well. Named Pink Wafer Biscuit Cave as it was really only
worth looking at after looking at all the other entrances.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-09
Wookey, Becka Lawson, Andrew Atkinson, Ollie Stevens,
More horizontal cave
Back to bag some more horizontal cave, despite having to walk back
down (Wook). All underground by 9.30. 1hr to pushing front. Off
resolutely North, past some very fine pretties for Austria. Then chamber
with pitch below and choice of A-leads. Took northerly one - soily
passage, then rift chamber, then descending phreatic, past a tricky c3
up into soily, wide place with passages down ahead and on right
(draughting towards us). Another off on L, draughting away. Main lead
down terminated at a clean aven & 4m passage blocked by soil choke.
Crawls continue. Air probably goes up aven.
Lead on R from soily place in huge passage almost full of soil.
Strong draught, goes to smallish aven then peters out in steeply
ascending tubes. Aven may be climable.
Lead on L goes only about 30m to pitch.
So went back to major lead at pitch chamber. Passage ascending at
consistent 23°ress; to East. Ollie came to join us as we started up
here & did a bit of ferreting. Did about 100m of this before Wook
had to start long journey home. Others continued, determined to clock up
at least 500m.
Passage was up to 1825m (60m below entrance). Wook out in a little
over an hour, just in time to get thunderstormed on along with Jon and
Morven (who had no cags & got soaked to skin).
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-09
Morven, Jon Telling,
Tunnocks - great, draughty lead
(Ollie Stevens brief cameo appearance)
Surveying trip down 'great, draughty lead'--left after Wikinki Beach
boulders, then second left along passage. Phreatic tube leads down and
W. Becoming increasing boulder-filled & uninspiring towards
end--[illegible] of large avens though, maybe where ‚---nght comes down.
Named "Dubious Pleasure". Morven's back was playing up in cold, so left
after few hrs.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-09
Jenny Black, Olly Betts,
148 - pitch stuff
Headed into 148 with way too much gear, but not enough crabs or
maillons. Got to the [saw?] pitch and the water levels rose considerably
making it very nasty & wet. Oh well, at least the rigging will be good
in high water ... Olly rigged a backup & bolt to get down the narrow bit
then got to a ledge where he rigged a nice Y-hang and went down through
a tight bit and then opened up lots to a deviation. This carried on down
to a big blackness with sadly no routes to drop down. It was quite [no
word here] by this point (especially for the power drill) so we came
back up - next time we need to rig it further out I guess. Came out of
the cave surveying a poxy side bit on the way. Came out in the dark and
clag - reflective markers are ace.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-10
Olly Betts, Jenny Black,
1987-02 - RH pitch
Went to survey & explore 1987-02. Headed to the RH pitch first. It
had a bolt which, combined with a couple of naturals & fending off from
the wall, got us down. Pitch lands at a junction, left (as you look down
the pitch) is BIG phreas with another way in from a little vertical
oxbow. This goes for a while then gets smaller and lower (but still 5m
wide). Eventually the gap between the rubble and roof becomes too low.
Would be diggable but doesn't draught. Back at the base of the pitch a
daylight aven comes in from straight on. To the right soon becomes a
rift, climbing high ends up choking, low down gets to a narrow
meandering rift turning left through which a howling draught blows out.
We both went a few metres in and noted that it echoes and is a bit tight
- the most promising a tight rift could be I guess. Again, back at the
pitch, kind of back underneath, is a phreatic passage that ends in a
hanging death choke that again draughts. Back at the entrance the other
way on drops into the same passage as the other one. Daylight comes in
from another shaft. Very interesting to get big phreas here ~1/2 way
between 76 and 161 ... worth prospecting in the area next year I
think.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-11
Becka Lawson, Aaron Curtis, Martin Green,
204 - ->Gaffered -> The Wares + Derig
Pootled to the Wares & headed off for a QM I'd been hankering after
checking. QM 04-49A. We'd left it as a steep ramp needing a handline in
2004. I rigged a handline up (needs ~25m rope) using 2 naturals then
hand bolted a spit on the left wall then a very fine thread on
the left wall then tied off on dodgy naturals at the top. Surveyed up to
find an extensive horizontal level - yippee. Sadly this was a derig trip
so we surveyed as much as we could, as far as a complex chamber with
several pitches, and we had to run out leaving lots of QMA's. Aaron's
light played up then fell apart and he couldn't find his spare
batteries, "I think I've learnt a lesson about redundancy today" says he
... Then slog, slog, slog, up the derig. Martin set off first with a
tacklesack & then pulled a second sack up Gaffered, I derigged & Aaron
did a tacklesack shuffle. We ended up getting 3 tacklesacks all the way
out, one at the bottom of E entrance pitch & one tied to the bottom of
Gaffered pitch so a pretty good job.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-12
Becka Lawson, Aaron Curtis, Martin Green,
204 - Gaffered derig + Thermistors
I got to the lowest rebelay on Gaffered & hauled up the tacklesack
tied to the bottom then derigged & Martin & I took out a tacklesack each
whilst Aaron switched his data loggers.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-12
Becka Lawson, Aaron Curtis, Martin Green,
258 - Tunnockschacht -> Stone Monkey
Second trip of the day: our reward for finishing the Gaffered derig.
Hadn't much time (set off from camp at 4pm) so we headed for a nearby
lead; the drafting hole halfway along the traverse down Ribs with
Knödel. This quickly opened into a steeply sloping, sizeable
passage heading steeply up (Stone Monkey). We surveyed until I was cold
and it was teatime, leaving QMA's and B's en route and finding large
ongoing passage.
T/U 4 hours Becka
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-13
Aaron Curtis, Ollie Stevens,
258 - South Tunnocks (Pantin Sales Pitch)
Another trip involving ping-ponging to and fro from the North & South
of Tunnocks. Went North to derig traverse past scree slope & commandeer
rope. Returned through Sauerkraut, surveyed 06-31A which turned out to
be an exceptionally smooth p30 duly named the Pantin Sales Pitch.
Checked out little horizontal passage to left which didn't go, and then
dropped the next pitch, yet unnamed, which surveyed to about 45m.
Exciting to find that we had been standing on a wedged pile of boulders
suspended above an airy rift. Single hang & backup got us to bottom
where it choked. Very likely way on (marked QMB) by traversing around to
right into spacious rift ~15m down the p45. Ollie suffered a bout of the
keenness so we went back north to meet Becka and Martin who were on
their way out and survey continuation of Flying High. Didn't manage very
much (~30m) before Aaron had had about enough. Avoiding stals / pretties
while maintaining our precarious position high in the rift while
surveying involved a form of Vedic Levitation. Rift got smoother &
wider; looks like next trip will need to drop down to (easily walkable)
rift floor & climb up again shortly. Blows a gale in there though.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-13
Martin Green, Becka Lawson,
258 - Maximum Pleasure leads in Tunnockschacht
Off down to the MP/Flying High junction and surveyed the walking
passage on the right (after ticking off a QM just before Dubious
Pleasure). This was fine, roomy walking passage. A large passage
underneath linked back to the main Maximum Pleasure passage. Our passage
went in fine style to a large aven with a smallish passage … with snow
… and pine cones and leaves … I got really excited by the potential
of an entrance which Martin was perplexed by, since I'd been unimpressed
by all the old stal that he'd been getting excited about. We kept
surveying past the aven and then it headed up a ramp & gradually became
smaller and less exciting before we left it at a c2 in a drippy aven. I
checked the snowy passage at the aven; it was small & headed up steeply
but the snow was rotten with holes in and it looked a bit dodgy so we
left it. We then went back to the MP/Flying High junction & did a QMA
near to it, on the left. This headed down steeply to a chamber with
large lumps of flowstone. It was really drafty and we were too cold to
face more so we headed out.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-13
Jenny Black, Olly Betts,
76 - derig
Decided to derig 76 so we at least only had one cave left rigged.
Didn't take the drill in to conserve battery power for 148 so couldn't
push deeper. Nice going through the testtubes with only SRT kits to
carry. Successful derig. To get to The Ledge needs 16 + 16 + 28 m of
rope.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-14
Becka Lawson, Julian Todd,
258 - Maximum Pleasure survey in Tunnockschacht
A fine, sunny morning so we hung around until all our gear was dry in
an attempt to have a warmish survey trip in Tunnockschacht. We started
by doing the left lead just after the traverse in Ribs with Knödel
[just beyond Caramel Catharsis]. This was extremely drafty & rapidly led
to a large pitch. We then headed to Maximum Pleasure, taking some snaps
en route. We surveyed from where Martin and I had left off yesterday, in
the flowstone chamber. We went past a large pitch & down to another,
smaller pitch then surveyed a small passage on the left and then did a
couple of legs up smaller passages to reconnect to the flowstone
chamber, making us feel virtuous. Martin and Olly turned up and we
pointed them to the remaining horizontal lead (which turned out to stop
after only ~30m). I then dragged Julian to the far end of Maximum
Pleasure to double-check that there were no other good leads to the
North. Nothing looked very tempting but I persuaded Julian to continue
the passage on the right where Wookey, Andrew and I had left off. This
headed up into awkward crawls and ceiling tubes and leads of 2-3m legs.
Unfortunately there was no good reason to stop so we just plodded on
until, thanks be, it finally, gradually lost the draft & fizzled out to
too-tight ceiling tubes.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-14
Jenny Black, Olly Betts,
82 - 81b and 82
We were feeling a bit tired so put off the 148 trip by another day
and went to tie up some loose ends in the 81/82 area. Started with a
surface survey from 81b to 148 in hope of improving the loop closure,
also tied in the 82 tag to 85.
Surveyed the remaining passage in 81 and checked out all the leads -
except for anything we missed there are no longer any leads. There was
nearly yet another entrance but it was blocked with rocks, doesn't seem
worth opening it up as 81 has more than its store of entrances
already.
Went into 82 to resurvey the upper level and check out the 'drafting
tube' noted in 1977 - it drafted lots and lots out and whilst it is very
tight the floor is muddy/sandy and could easily be dug. It is heading
for the similarly big phreas in 1987-02 and less than 200m away.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-14
Duncan Collis,
258 - Rigging Guide for Tunnockshacht entrance
drawn by Duncan
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-14
Aaron Curtis, Pete Harley,
204 - Final CSB thermistor trip
Hauled datalogger and thermistor out of CSB
[Chocolate Salty Balls], along with a tackle sack
of rope left from earlier derig. Aaron reprogrammed CSB logger to log
for coming year (recording once per hour, memory fills in 387 days).
Plunged back down E, replaced the CSB logger and Pete derigged E on the
way out.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-15
Jenny Black, Olly Betts,
148 - "Some Like it Pot" + derig
Running out of time so could no longer put off the final trip 148
trip. Only had to carry in the drilling stuff + the survey kit, so got
to the big pitch quite efficiently. Sorted out gear we had left there
and Olly set off down. I sat on the ledge at the Y-hang and shivered as
I watch Olly getting father away, and every so often there'd be some
tarzaning around for the rig. I noticed that Olly seemed to be quite
near the water - today it was essentially just water running / trickling
down the wall. I hoped it wouldn't rain.
Eventually it was my turn to descend, got down to where Olly was at a
huge jammed boulder which made a floor for a bit. There the rift seemed
to go 2 ways - rocks went for a long way down the straight-on-left
route, but a stronger draft seemed to come from the right. This led
shortly down to a bouldery floor. The rift continued over a jammed rock,
a big draught comes from here. Olly went some way down - it doesn't
trivially join the other route and rocks also fall a long way...
I was cold and Olly had done a lot of rigging so we decided to start
the derig. It didn't go too badly (even the tight rift bits) and we got
all four tackles out before it got too tiring.
T/U 9 3/4 hours
148 rigging
the rigging in Some Like it Pot needs some adaption in case it rains,
but currently would be more unpleasant than suicidal.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-15
Becka Lawson, Julian Todd, Aaron Curtis, Duncan Collis, Martin Green, Pete Harley,
topcamp - Packing Steinbruckenhoehle Bivvy
Pete, Aaron and Dunks had already done a monster carry yesterday,
leaving the 7 of us a mere double carry today - we got everything down
in 17 loads, packing up the bivi inbetween and heading down the second
time at 8 pm with the final rays of sunset pinkening the slabs.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-16
Becka Lawson,
basecamp - Rope Washing
Tony and Djuke had back to collect spit so gave us a hand and Jenny
and Olly came down the hill with their rope so, thankfully, there were
decent numbers for the mammoth rope washing, checking, chopping and
labeling + assorted scrubbing.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-17
Becka Lawson,
basecamp - Sketching + Packing
I started drawing up surveys at 7am. Around 10 people were starting
to emerge after last nights deep fat fried glove extravaganza. The
conversation idly turned to ferry times as Tony et al set off home.
Dunks decided when on the 19th his ferry went and came back and asked
the date. "The 17th". "My ferry leaves in 12 hours." "The 19th is when I
fly to China." Fine-honed expo machine spluttered into action and within
the hour the wheels were on the trailer, it was filled with rope and the
tarps strapped on, Martin had been working from his hung-over lie in,
their gear was packed up, they'd been fed a cooked breakfast, sandwiches
packed and they were on the road... With a good chance of making the
ferry. After this firestorm we slumped for a while then started cleaning
and I sketched until 3am, by which time I only had Pete for company who
was on a one bender trying to beat Nial's beer tally. The last bits of
plan for maximum pleasure were a bit ropey but I got there in the end
ready for a 7.30 start to catch our train to Italy.
T/U: 0.0 hours
2007-08-17
Becka Lawson,
204 - Razordance Rigging Guides - scanned in, presumably from a logbook
[Author unknown, presumed to be Becka. These diagrams do not actually appear in the scanned logbook
so must have been done on separate bits of paper. We should search the wallets to see who did them.]
T/U: 0.0 hours