CUCC Expeditions to Austria: 1976 - 2024

Down Gaffered Series aargh, this rope is way too fast, welly-brake-tastic... To Gardeners' World + I went over my "Generation Game" traverse to check that it really did go nowhere (sigh) then derigged it (not too exciting bar one overly-dynamic swing into space). Earl then did some re-rigging of Gardeners' World + rigged the pitch below to Subsoil chamber. I was cold so scampered around for 5 minutes whilst Earl packed his drill up + I realised that we had some considerable new cave here – so into survey mode. From chamber surveyed around chamber + then up Hippo Hollows (lovely mud pots) to a thin rift with a large wet pitch around the corner then back to Subsoil + surveyed a loop then time to go home. Good stuff!

Oh yes, I forgot the crap bit, coming up the Gaffered pitch series the mud on the rope meant that not one but both my jammers were slipping, despite me having switched to a brand new chest jammer that day. At one point I got really unhappy and gave a mewling sound then thought of a solution: my spare hand jammer on a long cowstail went above my other hand jammer. A bit slower but surely not all three can slip? Finally got to the 70m Gaffered pitch which was lovely + clean rope (relatively) + I was going to survive. Earl Teflon-Jammers Merson was, of course, fine + blamed it all on my poor technique.