Tunnockschacht - Stone Monkey
Martin Jahnke
Bolted pitch at end of Sombrero passage, 'The flaming sword of fire'. 2 Spits at start of traverse line, then ~4m down (rope protector required), then another 2 spits in right hand wall (relatively good rock). Crumbly rock below which forced me to set a spit for a deviation on the opposite wall (done by putting a sling over a boulder wedged between 2 walls and pulling in - scary stuff). Descended to bottom with rope being 1.5m too short (29m required). Bottom of pitch covered with boulders and several drips coming down at far side, small chamber was entered which terminated in tight meander (water flowing in) with moderate draft and choked tight rift in 90 degree angle to it (too tight). In the small chamber, rift can be seen below - just about man-sized but window would have to be blasted. Yorkshire A lead, Austria dead end. Nice pitch though [QM D?? Kathryn].
[rigging diagram]
Whilst going through stone monkey squeeze, I found a dead ground beetle (Carabidae) on one of the rocks. Another indication that we are somewhere close to the surface! There is also black soil (humous?) below many of the avens in Stone Monkey - we will see.
[Written later] Second thoughts on the bottom of this pitch: its a dig! Everybody interested would have to hammer his way through a bit of solid rock to get to the rift that can be seen below to enter the tight meander ahead. Maybe it goes.