Topic

26-01-13.

After mentioning to Brian C on friday evening that Alum direct was on my 'to-do-list' for this year I was please and instantly aprehensive on Saturday morning when he said that we were going to do it .

So after digging out the car from the snow we ventured off up the road, packing the shovel for emergencies, this turned out to be a wise desicion as we had to dig out a parking spot at the bottom of the lane.
Arriving at the top of the pitch Brian swung into action by starting to rig from the tree and disappear over the edge to rig the re-belays. Before he descended the main pitch I could hear him read out his check list....
Knots- check, decender- check, cowstail-check, shitting myself- check. and off he went carefully followed by me stopping now and again to look around and take some photos of the amazing ice formations.
Arriving at the bottom we admired an ice encrusted branch before deciding that we may as well go down to look at the sump.
Off back up- I derigged the small pitch and and after another scout around looking for signs for Alex and Gordon I started my rather slow ascent back to the top ( giving a tired wave to some other cavers watching at the window) passing the first re-belay I realised that I had made a mistake ,I had my accender rope threaded through the Y hang to my harness . a lesson learned.
Brian made short work of his ascent though and we were both soon packed up and off back.
stopping to make a big YSS sign in the snow.
suprised that the roads were a lot clearer we stopped at selside to pay our dues.

Great trip , Thanks Brian.

P Horner B Cullen . trip time approx 2 1/2 hours

Alum direct not on my todo list dont like daylight pitches being scared of heights

my drive up Alum pot lane that day

Our trip was the similar until we got to the South East (or is it north?) , tied a bowline round a tree near the wall to protect the snowy and likely icey approach got to the big tree and immediately we had a problem. The sling was way too short. Gordon had a spare so I tied the two together and it still would not fit round the right hand part of the tree, so we rigged off the left hand half of the tree (still 2ft diameter) and I abbed down but after 10ft I realised that there was massive rope rub on the tree with no P's in sight I had to abort.

We then went into the churns and unintentionally explored an inlet near Diccan before we both practiced rigging the Dolly tubs traverse route, where I practiced a tri-hang.

If you were on the SE route, as you abseil facing the wall there is a short swing to the right about 15 feet from the ledge with a P bolt, there is a direct hang from this, should be no rope rub, its a nice pitch. Hope this helps dude.