A story of things lost and forgotten
A trip that intended to be a Pip to Bye George or Peterson depending on how were feeling and the state of the in-situ rope, however thanks to me plans had to be revised.
In my usual hectic way I had forgotten not only my over-suit but my harness as well. Nevertheless I persevered, using a waterproof trousers in lue of my over-suit and a belay belt and a sling for an uncomfortable harness. Thankfully I would only be going down as I decided I was not going up Bye Geroge or Peterson now. Partly due to comfort but mainly because I did not trust the thing we had made.
Not having an oversuit turned out to be a good move, the squeezes where extra easy, I even did not have to remove my ‘custom’ harness. Chris followed suite and decided to remove his for one of the squeezes though Don and Dan did not. A rather nervous descent for me soon took us to the main stream way and out into hall of the ten in no time at all, unfortunately not finding Ales’s gear even in these low water conditions. (You sure you lost them in this cave, Ales?).
So with time to kill we ventured downstream to the pitch in Pip. It looked nice and big, which is a complete contrast to most of the passage leading to it, however we had not brought any rope to rig it. Next we explored the passages around red-line chamber and a crawl at the bottom that went on for ever… even I decided to turn around due to sheer boredom and sore knees. The surveyor’s also appeared to have done this as I am sure I went much further than is shown on the survey! The passage appears to be heading to link pot, to the east side.
We decided to exit I had taken Don’s gear as a favour for him spotting my watch which fell off my arm. I had not seen that Dan had left my bag in the four-ways chamber. I noticed Dan did not have it at the entrance so had a very quick venture back to 4 ways chamber to get it. Its quite tiring running while stooping, but I think I got from the entrance to 4ways and back again in about 5 minutes as I caught up with the others on the fell.
(me) Alex, Chris Sham, Dan, Don
P.s. my waterproof trousers are of course trashed.
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