Tunnocks - Shallow Tunnocks leads - Double Barrel
Aidan Marks
We decided to investigate leads in Tunnocks due to expected rain. I went to the base of the entrance pitch whilst the others negotiated their way down. Eventually we met the campers (Rob, Becka and Jacob) who passed the others on the entrance series, and Ruairidh and Pete headed back to the surface after some extensive SRT practice.
Fleur and I checked out a number of leads in Tunnocks (three QMA in the Double Barrel area, all small pitches to be dropped) which fell apart due to apparent dodgy historic surveying. The first QMA we checked out was through Starfish Junction, again past Petticoat Junction; however, we came across a 15m pitch in the way of this lead which we had missed on the survey, and could not cross the pitch so abandoned this lead after some viewing.
As an alternative we went the alternate way down Hedonism Highway to 2008-41-B(?) in Rocky Road. This lead was very promising, continuing for 40m or so up some climbs until we found a 2009 era rope down a pitch lead. As a result we abandoned these leads and decided to investigate the survey further.
Note from Fleur: I could find no record of this lead being pushed in the 2008 - 2016 logbooks, no data in Survex and nothing in Tunnel. A mystery!
Back to Aidan: an alternate route down Rocky Road led to a series of P5 pitches which allegedly produced a QMB; however, after dropping these with naturals and hand bolting (good practice for me) we discovered this lead was in fact an aven.
After this, we headed out. The trip was very good practice for me and I hope for Ruairidh as well. Mainly, I hope Fleur enjoyed a run around Tunnocks as much as I did.