New personal depth record

My new personal best for depth is now -315m, after a good long stint in Propantes. a group of us went up at the weekend with enough rope to rig a good 250 meters beyond the lead we were intending to push, but things (starting with the strength of the rock, but also the morphology of the place) were against us.

The rest of the group - everyone apart from Erato and myself went through the narrows at -315m into the "new sections" of the cave but came to a dead end a little further than they had gone last month. There is still a lot more work to be done.

And of course, the weather was fine while we were entering and while we were inside (although it was raining inside from the drippings of the humidity) and a little before the last man came out, the rain started. It drizzled, then it picked up, then it worsened, then it got better - like this, right up until about two pm the next day - so we packed our tents and got everything together in the rain, and mud everywhere, in the cave, out of the cave, in our hair, in our sleeping bags - mud everywhere.

Anyway - I am not as hampered by excesses of lactic acid as I was during my first wisit to the cave, but I am a little sore here and there and a little bruised from my chest harness.

In all though, the new personal best was worth it, as was the fun to be had all weekend with the other boys and girls.

Back to Parnon

I spent last weekend up on the Paliochora plateau again, the last weekend of the season. Next year again - and all of winter to complete the write-ups.

This weekend, going back to Parnon, a little further south, this time, to the famous Propantes. Currently at -315m officially, a little more in practice and hopefully, by this time tomorrow, a lot more in practice. I am not making any promises about writing anything about this, as this year has been a difficult one for keeping up to date on the blog or more generally. I have only just managed to put up my report on Paloumba (January 2005)!