CUCC Expeditions to Austria: 1976 - 2024

Before this entry begins I'd like to make it clear that I feel truly ashamed of my performance (or lack of one) on this trip. I failed to meet the standard expected of one signing onto a trip of this nature, and by this failure I caused a lot of negative attention to be bought onto the trip and my companions.
I take full responsibility and I am sorry.

I was a coherent but faffy start to the trip. The plan was that Lara and I would walk down from Garlic to Homecoming, meeting Harry and Chi who'd be walking up from base camp. It was 20 past 10 when we all met up. This sounds completely reasonable, and indeed it is if I neglect to mention that our planned meeting time was 9:30. It hadn't been the most pleasant walk up for poor Chi and Harry, the weather being exceptionally poor when they began their walk. It transpired that they had actually rang everyone in residence at Garlic, with the hope of requesting the trip be scrubbed. Unfortunately, Garlic being a cave, and none of us being awake at 10 to 8 in the morning their attempts were in vein.

Heavy faff then proceeded to follow for a while. I can't remember how long exactly but 2 hours sounds about right. Trying to get everything adequately into bags + work out what was going where and indeed what we actually had around us was a bit of a task and a half. We took so long in fact that Aiden and Rosa, setting off from garlic far later than Lara and I, managed to get into the cave before us.

Finally entering the cave with 10 minute intervals between us we had two dense bags each to manipulate through the entrance series. This was the start of my downfall. At the first rifty bit before Radogast I sunk down in the rift wedged by one bag on top of me squashing me down, but unable to lift myself up due to my hip being held taught by the hauling line on the second bag. Getting myself out (after a great deal of help from Lara and Harry) annoyed, slightly shaken, and questioning my abilities somewhat, we pressed on. My next obstacle was to come just moments later at the traverses approaching Wallace. Once again I had difficulties with the bags, never quite having the strength or dexterity to align them in a manner cohesive with good caving. This (and the exact causal relationship im still unaware of) managed to stir up many unpleasant memories of my childhood and teenage years. I then struggled rather too much lifting myself up on each re-belay. The cumulative effect of these events meant I reached the bottom of the pitches in a rather unsettled and uncomfortable state of mind.

Propane nightmares was up next and I fell well behind moving the, now one bag, along with me. If I may also take a tangent here, I'd like to announce my hatred for the Petzl Portage 30 liter bag. What an dismally stupid idea it was to place the attachment point for the donkey dick 3/4 of the way up the bag rather than at the top. The placement means that every attempt to move it,the bag ends up dragging at an angle, wedging itself on any outcrop that it happens to come by. Dragging the bag through propane nightmares made me feel like I had travelled back in time to 2021 and I was piloting the Ever Given through the Suez Canal.

By this point I had mentally checked out of the trip and wanted nothing more than to be in the daylight cradling a Gosser and floating around the lake. The thought of strained by gravity, and especially the traverses afterwards filled me with dread. It was also here where the noise from the water falling ahead was noticed, calling into question if a camp would be possible at all. After much deliberation it was decided the others would continue to the camp site, dump the equipment somewhere dry, meanwhile I would huddle at the top of Strained by Gravity in the group shelter, listening to a pod cast and feeling sorry for myself.

In the group shelter I listened to The Rest Is History podcast episode on the history of British Elections. Very interesting! Eventually the others returned and we started to make our way out of the cave. Chi had his bluetooth speaker with him, and holy fuck drum and bass approaching you at ever increasing volume is a terrifying motivator for getting up pitches quickly. At one of the re belays near the top of Grommit I did have to ask for the music to briefly be paused however, as I worked out how to un string up myself. In a brief lack of focus I forgot to remove the old rope before putting the new one in at the re-belay. It only took a couple of attempted prussics to realise that something had gone rather wrong.
There is a feature on the CT chest jammers which I have been aware of, and often talk about, but have never had to use in the wild.
"The metal ring on the cam catch" I tell freshers, "Is brilliant, as you can actually grip it properly to open it, and if you get jammed, you can clip your footloop through the loop to stamp the cam out if it all goes to shit!". After trying to open the cam by hand at the re belay I quickly realised what I had to do. It is with a great deal of excitement I can announce that the technique worked perfectly. In fact, lost in the relief and excitement of the moment I believe I yelled down the pitch "Fuck yeah, CT, I love you!". The journey out from that point on passed rather unproblematically. Lara had a brief uncomfortable moment when during reaching for a couple of mars bars that had fallen down a rift, she tilted forwards and slipped into said rift unconnected to any traverse line. I'll leave it to her to describe this episode in more detail as my description definitely did not do it justice.

We got out just gone 7pm, and made our way back down the plateau. I am aware that this is a controversial decision, and one that has no doubt been the subject of much discussion. This log book entry, being written by one member of the party, isolated from his former team mates and their thoughts, is not the place for this discussion. Not wishing to damage the discourse or my party by offering a reasoning, I will avoid giving one till they can consult.

Only a few more matters to discuss before the end of this entry. Firstly, Casualties. My descender (and footloop and ascender) I like to keep clipped to a side gear loop when not in use. I abhor a cluttered D-Ring. On traversing the rift just before Strained by Gravity on the way out (the one with the corner traverse line) my descender, which must have been inadequately clipped to my gear loop by my numb fingers pinged off and clattered to rest down a 20m unexplored rift. Rescue should be possible if one wanted to push the lead.
Secondly when shaking out a tackle bag at the gear dump, Chi and Harry noticed a mystery item fall out and likewise tumble down a rift. This was my first aid kit. The rift is not a lead and rescue is taken to be impossible.

We have been told it is important to note that the cave was still wet and drippy even 12 hours after the previous rain. I'm sure this will be typed up on the next set of survey notes.

This is only one small part of the story, and I'm sure some companion editions would be welcomed and are coming soon from the other members of the trip.

Finally to my companions I am sorry again. I owe you all a lot of beers.

Homecoming Camping Trip 24-07-2024
MIA: Petzl Simple under the command of I.Neale
KIA: Compact First Aid Kit under the command of I.Neale, on secondment to H.Kettle, C.Khulmann

Lara's Version of Events:

First of all, I'd like to note that turning round was the right decision for the whole group and no blame should be put on anyone. It was too wet to push that day anyway and getting all the camping stuff where it needed to be was a successful effort in itself. Most importantly, if any member of any trip decides for whatever reason they don't want to continue caving the correct thing to do is turn round.

The actual trip was faffy and tiring, but pretty fun. Entertaining moments include: Chi's absolute horror at the amount of food we brought (half a noodle pack per person is apparently not enough) and the absolute levels of rage we achieved at the ever increasing number of bags. Chi and I capped out at 3 for Strained by Gravity, and Harry at 4.

The morale was pretty good when we'd had a final snack with Issac but I got a bit unhappy at the watershed traverses, finding the idea of turning round pretty demoralising. Some kind words from Harry and a little helpful bullying from Chi sorted me out. The other two planned to zoom out to see if we could get a lift down the hill before drinking happened at base camp but Harry decided that it was unwise to leave me and Issac at the back alone so waited for me at the top of strained by gravity. Probably a good decision.

We all zoomed (read with scepticism) out the entrance series to Chi's pounding D and B: very motivating. In my slightly delirious state I tried to rescue a dropped chocolate bar from a slanted rift after Wallace. I would like to state I succeeded in rescuing it, but then my foot loop betrayed me and I ended up stuck head first laughing at myself. Chi rescued me in turn.

A good but chaotic trip