Tunnocks - 1st camping trip
Chris Densham
The team out in the first week had done a tremendous job, rigging Tunnocks down to Kraken in 3 days. After arriving we washed, dried and stuffed 1km of rope into tacklesacks and carried half of it up the hill. On Tuesday morning we packed the camp kit, drill, rigging gear and Elliott managed to cart a 200m bag of rope down to camp. I fettled the rigging as required on the way in eg a deviation on Magic Glue and eliminating a catchy rub at the bottom of Inferno, which now lands on a rock bridge, saving ~10m further descent and re-ascent. I added a traverse line and descending Kraken was rewarded by the green glow from the Camp Kraken tent. Katey and Elliott had had to drain it and scrape the mould off the floor to make it habitable - even having to scrape calcite off the zip to get in. It was a comfortable night.
NB - Elliott from here:
Day 2 saw us heading down to the pushing front at Paw Paw passage. All was left rigged, bar the Song of the Earth ramp. ~120m of rope disappeared on that one. We carried on to the mud sump (-902m) and took some photos. We retraced a small continuation when a more modern stream (read trickle) had carved out a bit of the mud. Katey went for it and found it too tight… she did notice a draft however, albeit a small one.
Onto Paw Paw, katey climbed the C6 left last year and bolted it. The passage up a rifty (but still phreatic) section, approx. 3 - 6m wide, 6m high, still drafting. At this point, Elliott climbed an aven to the left (West) whilst Chris and Katey surveyed. Two rift passages soon crapped out. Elliott’s aven (‘Aye, there’s the rub’) rises for ~25m before leading to a ~20m pitch. Katey found a rising tube to the North about halfway up the climb, 2 pitches here, again ~20m. Out of rope, battery and willpower, we headed back to camp.
Next day (Thursday) we headed out. Left camp at 10am, out between 13:00 - 16:00.