Lifeguards rescued an exhausted woman stuck at the bottom of a 80 feet blowhole, after a friend who had managed to scramble out alerted them.
Max Wilson, 28, was on holiday in Cornwall with Lucy Pattinson, 27, from Devon, when the pair decided to go for a walk and explore the landmark near Padstow, known locally as Round Hole.
The pair soon climbed down into the opening of the blowhole, but realised the way out involved an almost vertical ascent.
Wilson managed to limb his way out and immediately rushed back to the beach to seek help for Wilson.
Round Hole, near Padstow, is a large blowhole with a depth of just over 24 metres. It is a very prominent and visited landmark in Cornwall but lifeguards advise against going near the edge
Max Wilson, 28, and Lucy Wilson, 27, (far right) decided to go on an adventure and climbed down the blowhole
The incident happened on Monday, July 26, at around 1pm.
Round Hole is a very large blowhole with a depth of just over 24metres.
A cave situated at the bottom connects to the sea and through to Trevone beach.
Many people visit the impressive landmark, situated on the headland north of Trevone beach, by walking along the coast path.
Pattinson said: 'I am so grateful to the RNLI lifeguards who came to rescue me, they are legends.
'I really think we just weren't aware of the seriousness of the situation we were in at the time, as we were trying to deal with it.
'Looking back I realise it could have been a very different outcome and I wanted to share my story to raise awareness of the dangers.'
'When we got to the hole we thought; 'that looks fun, let's go on an adventure, let's climb down.'
'So Max went down first and I took my bag off at the top and followed down after him. It just didn't seem that dangerous on the way down, as we were going down we didn't even look up or think about how we were possibly going to get out.
'When we were at the bottom, the cave down there was so beautiful we were just exploring and enjoying the cave and rocks. We sat there for ages just admiring it all.'
After some time in the cave, the pair decided to head back out, but soon understood they were in quite a difficult and dangerous situation.
'When we looked at the route we'd come down, it looked almost vertical, I instantly thought, 'how did we not realise how dangerous this was on the way down?' said Pattinson.
Even though the ascent was very steep, Pattinson attempted to climb out with some encouragement from Wilson.
She climbed at least 8feet, but the earth was dry and sandy and it made it difficult for her to grab hold of.
Trying to grab grass but failing, she slid all the way back down the side of the hole.
Thankfully, she remembered to lean forward as there were so many rocks beneath her.
She had minor cuts on her legs from sliding down.
