Eldon Hole

After meeting at Morrison’s in Buxton, us arriving later than planned due to us trying a different route than usual, and Ben’s breakfast arriving even later, we finally arrived at Eldon hole around noon. I rigged the West Wall whilst Andy rigged the South Gully.

Andy rigging the South Gully

After a little swearing from Andy’s end of the rift we were soon at the bottom and scrambling through the short grubby crawl in to the main chamber. Andy pointed out the pull through for Millers Chamber and warned that it could take some time to get the rope through, but Jess and I employed a pull-me push-me approach and managed to get it rigged in around 10 minutes. As Andy and Mel had been up there before, and as there would be a queue to ascend, they decided to start the prussic back up whilst the rest of us went to take a look.  It was nice to see the lads finally out of breath after the short ascent to Millers chamber, but I think they’ll agree it was well worth it with sparkling calcite slopes, 6ft stalactites and plenty of flowstone. After a quarter of an hour poking around and playing we made our way back down to the main chamber. For practice it had been decided that Ben and Carl would de-rig. Jess shot up the west wall followed by Ben and I went up the South Gully with Carl following. I think it’s fair to say that both lads found the de-rig tiring, but as youth trumps intelligence they were already looking forward to their next chance to play on the ropes whilst walking back to the car! The lads were in a hurry to get back (probably to start cleaning all the rope we’d given them ;), but Andy, Mel, Jess and myself finished the day with tea and cake at the café by Hitch ’n’ Hike.

Andy descending

Present: Andy Grimes, Mel Wakeman, Jessica Harding, Ben Marklew, Carl Knot & Mark Burkey