Quick lead mine trip

It was one of those non-digging weeks, and that was OK, because the ThursdayNighters had a fairly small mine in mind. I knew it well! And David wanted to do some re-rigging as there was a pitch that was a bit dubiously constructed. He wanted to put a chain in the place of an old rope. Good idea!

Dacid and I drove up together (but not before he admired my living room). And only Ed, Edwyn and Jason joined us on the parking lot; Edwyn only to donate some chain. He was having a cold and would go home again when we would walk up! A calm trip this.

Edwyn drove our bags up (nice!) and then we walked to the entrance. David faffed a bit with the entrance pitch as well. I went down and waited at the top of the next pitch. Soon David appeared, chain and all. We tried to fix it in position. It was a bit of faff! He had some split links of which he had to hammer the pins flat, and that can be a faff if you don't have a nice flat background to do it on, but we managed. And we figured we would have to go back and change the handline that lead to the second pitch. It was getting a bit knackered!

We went down the second pitch too. There we sat down for a sarnie and some tea. And then we went all the way down! And walking out was a bit cold; I had forgot to bring my neoprene socks for the occasion. Oh well. And we came out quite early! Lovely! Especially as I would have a long tough day at work the next day. And it's nice to see the chaps!