So last night I got some practice for vertical caving. My friend Jon that got me hooked on caving also does a lot of rope work. He bought some special rope and used a knot system to make an ascending system. It is basically a slip knot: when you put downward pressure on the rope it grips the climbing rope and prevents you from sliding down. When you release pressure you can slide it up.
So Jon rigged a climbing rope on the top floor of the stair well in Dana Hall. There is a nice shaft going down to the basement level. Jon taught Brandon and I (and Megan and Jason came over) how to tie the knots and do all the rigging and then he let us go up. When we reached the top of the rope he stood on the stairs and walked us through changing from our ascending system to our belay device while still up in the air, on the rope. I got the hang of it, and it's pretty fun. The next practice will be on a tree on campus. Jon wanted to do it in the stair well first so that he could be up on our level walking us through the process.
I'm on my way to getting into Sinks of the Roundstone pit! After we get some more practice and are plenty proficient it'll be off!
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