Derig France
Julian Shilton
"You're lying around the campsite festering. Bugger off and get the rope out of France."
"Sodding hell. Do we have to ?"
"Yes. Bugger off."
Normal boring derigging trip. Forget grease, fetch grease. Whizz down to bottom, prussik slowly out - Prussick, prussick Sod the tacklebags caught again. Free tacklebag prussick prussick. Repeat until caver gets bored, and then about ten times longer. Aargh. End result the air is turned completely blue as caver gets within six inches of last rebelay (France - whole armies of rebelays lying in wait for naive speleologist. Has anyone else ever noticed how there always seem to be more on the way out than on the way in. I always lose count - seemingly around fifteen. Anyone ever wondered how many different types of bolt there are in the world ? You find out down France. The bastard that rigged it made every sodding rebelay too tight. Hours staring at all the different bolts. Your dreams become filled with bollards, simple bends, rings and clowns all laughing at you. I swear there's one type that moves round the wall. Coming down - nice ledge in just the right place. Going up - shit my feet are six inches above the ledge and two feet further out ! That bloody clown's laughing at me again. Its the eyes following you around that really gets to me though.)
Tacklesacks - bastards. Hate cavers. Refuse to go down caves. Hate it when you try and take them out again. Bastards. Nothing more to say really.
One more thing. Left campsite at noon. Got back at 9:10. How long is the walk ?
Um yeah !
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