by chh » Oct 19, 2005 1:42 pm
Well, the trip to Fantastic went well, but I didn't get any pictures of the bolts in the attic.
As it was my first time there, I can't really comment on whether or not the condition of the surrounding rock has deteriorated as I don't know what it looked like before.
That being said, the bolts themselves didn't look bad, nor did the rock around it. They were, however, spaced a little too close to one another. They didn't really look any more suspect to me than the newer bolts at the top of the warm up pit, which we used. That being said, we still chose to rig from a rock in the attic, maybe more for our own piece of mind after hearing they were dangerous. There were lots of grooves in the rock at both the warm up drop and in the attic indicating that just about every rig point we could see had been used, though I wouldn't know anything about the ages of them.
In addition, the handline that runs up the scramble to the short roped climb to get into the attic (and the bypass to the balcony) was frayed at the knot. I did the scramble without it, as I was first up and don't really trust strange ropes - especially handlines. I went back down and bounce tested it as much as I could to no appreciable effect. 2 other cavers with me used the handline at the very top where there is an awkward bit, especially if you are shorter or carrying a very heavy load on your back. The fixed line on the short climb up to the attic itself was in ok condition, but obviously well used.
I hope this is helpful to someone, and I wish I would have snapped some pictures, but by the time we were packing up to leave the pit we were already well overdue on our exit time and decided to scamper out of there quickly.
I guess the moral of the story is that I can't really comment 100% on the condition of the bolts as I didn't use them. I almost always trust a BFR more than a set of bolts when caving. I can only suggest that anyone doing Fantastic would use their own discretion and err on the side of caution, but you guys already knew that;)
cave softly,
-chh
Your words of caution are no match for my disaster style!