Peterson Pot

Tony Seddon, Simon Longley, Alison Adams, Paul Brooks

A small article in Descent 167 gives details of recent Red Rose discoveries reached by scaling Hall of the Mountain King in Pippikin Pot. It also mentions a new connection with Peterson Pot. Peterson Pot's description in Northern Caves 3 reads OK (Grade IV, Length 116m, Depth 40m, 5 short pitches) but contains the warning 'Very tortuous in parts. Think of the return journey.' The cave was extended by the Happy Wanderers in 1969, which takes it up another notch or two on my respect scale.

Alison, Jamie and I had been discussing the possibilities for a Peterson trip after our recent visit to Illusion Pot & happened to bump into Tony, who was also keen on the idea. The plot thickened when we learned Simon was available and a small cave team was formed (that is a team for small caves rather than a team of small cavers, as some of us aren't that small if you get my drift). Jamie's work roster changed & he dropped out leaving the four of us.

We were all late for our 12 o'clock meeting in Ingleton, but 2pm saw us all fed, watered and ready for action. We drove up to Leck Fell House and received the usual friendly welcome. Various plans were discussed - Peterson in and out, Peterson in / Pippikin out, Peterson in / Mistral out & we decided on a compromise that would get us down and hopefully find the route to the Hall of the Mountain King. If we succeeded we would go back to de-rig downwards from the 3rd pitch and then head out through Mistral. We decided not to carry ascending gear, which ruled out Pippikin Pot as an exit. If we couldn't get through, the pitches would be sufficiently rigged to get out (thinking of the return journey).

By 3pm we had located the entrance & were ready to descend with 2 x 10m & 2 x 5m ladders, a 19m rope, a length of 'tat', several slings, spreaders and bolts. The 1st pitch is at the bottom of the entrance shakehole and was rigged with a 10m ladder (we were saving our short ladders for further down) from a sling on a spike. A short walking passage & crawl leads to the 2nd pitch, which was rigged with a 5m ladder from an overhead chockstone. The obvious passage quickly chokes and the way on is Roly Poly Passage - a small tube on the right.

Tony led the way and we were soon treated to bouts of giggling from the front. With hindsight I think this was a better technique for dealing with Roly Poly Passage than my initial technique of fighting and cursing (fortunately I got my head sorted). Simon followed with a few mild expletives, then Alison and I. I tried the first section several times trying different arrangements with tackle and ladder & eventually got through the first squeeze after pushing the tackle through to where Alison could reach them and pushing my helmet and generator ahead of me. This section of passage certainly lived up to its name, with several writhing, twisting manoeuvres required to get round the bends.

We reached an inlet on the left and the floor dropped to allow standing upright (one at a time). This was the last obvious place to turn around before the end of the continuing crawl. The crawl was of the small keyhole type (a body sized tube above a narrow slot) with the slot just wide enough in places to allow gear to be irretrievably lost. This section continues in an awkward Roly Poly style (several awkward bends caused further cursing from various people) until a sudden emergence above a drop (2m in the book, but a bit more than 2 of my metres). Tony managed to thread a sling round a chockstone and emerge safely. A ladder was rigged as an aid for the rest of us. The manoeuvre required clipping into the sling, then launching out head first reaching down on sloping holds, keeping your legs up to avoid them dropping into the slot and jamming, until they could be swung out and onto the ladder - interesting.

We had now been in the cave for over 3 hours - most of it in the approximately 100m length of Roly Poly Passage! 2 short pitches should lead to the link with Pippikin. The 3rd pitch takes off immediately below the drop and has a handy rock spike for a sling. A 10m ladder was hung off this and it was lined from the overhead sling. A snug descent leads down to the stream and a small chamber before the 4th pitch. A thread well back on the right provided a belay for the 5m ladder. Tony descended the pitch, then Simon & just as Alison was stepping on, Tony reappeared having investigated the bottom & found a climb & traverse to the top. There was no way on at the bottom other than the direct take-off for the last pitch & the only other way on was a muddy crawl leading off opposite the head of the 4th pitch. This was easily reached by traversing over & we de-rigged the ladder & rigged the tat as a traverse line.

A short crawl led to an aven and a choice of routes; low, muddy and dry ahead or low, muddy with a puddle to the left. Optimistically Alison chose the former. This was followed to another aven and no way on. My turn now and I crawled into the puddle, sadly spoiling the experience for those following by pushing its contents out ahead of me. The roof lifted and a water-washed section was followed into an almost dry streamway with obstacles created by fallen blocks. After a few more metres the crawl emerged into a much larger passage with a loose boulder floor. I carefully noted the point of entry and turned downhill.

A short climb down was followed by a section of solid passage and a rope hanging down from above. Around a corner to the right was a pitch with a rope looped over a nose of rock. This must be the way, but the bottom wasn't recognisable. We decided to check up the slope from our point of entry to the large passage, just to make sure there was nothing else - there wasn't. We were still thinking about the return journey, but decided that I would descend the rope and see if I could recognise anything at the bottom. A very low hang was a bit awkward to get on (I thought 'Alison won't like this'), but after a short abseil I was at the bottom. Another rope was hanging down round the corner to the left, but there was a descending continuation round the corner to the right.

After a short distance there was a definite feeling of spaciousness and I spotted another rope rigged from bolts on the left wall. I shouted back my findings to the others and continued. I approached the pitch head nervously having no ascending gear (although I could have achieved a makeshift rig with bits of cord and my Stop). After a bit of faffing getting onto the rope and trying to find the best braking krab arrangement on the muddy rope (I thought 'Alison really won't like this'), I started descending, hoping the rope reached the bottom. After a while my light was able to make out the bottom through the cloud of steam I was producing. Things were looking good - the rope reached and the bottom looked vaguely familiar. I landed and scrambled up increasingly muddy boulders to a very familiar track through deep, sticky mud. We were indeed in the Hall of the Mountain King; the pitch landed in the only clean part of the chamber, which I had visited once before. A loud cheer conveyed my findings to the others.

Tony headed back to strip as much tackle as he could from the pitches. This was everything except a sling at the head of the drop (could prove useful for others) and a bit of tat. Meanwhile Simon joined me at the bottom. Alison waited for Tony to return and then managed the pitches with no problems whatsoever. Soon reunited and all feeling very happy if a little weary, we followed the well worn route to the much easier Mistral entrance to Pippikin Pot. The final climb out was negotiated and we emerged to the last traces of daylight at 9.30 pm. Tony and I de-rigged the first two Peterson pitches whilst Simon & Alison cancelled the call-out. A swift change and we made the Marton Arms just before 11pm to rehydrate and reflect on a superb trip.

This trip felt much harder than a trip via the Pippikin entrance (imagine if the Happy Wanderers had found the continuation over the 4th pitch!). I think doing the trip 'blind' as we did heightened the excitement - there was always the thought of dragging the gear back through Roly Poly Passage. Roly Poly is a real gem - it is never really, really tight, but it is very sustained and awkward and feels like the longest 100m I've ever done. Our hats go off to the Red Rose for creating the link and making this trip a possibility, but especially to the Happy Wanderer (Hilda?) who pushed and pushed down the seemingly irreversible contortions of Roly Poly Passage. Thanks also to Tony who took the lead and pushed on where many much smaller mortals would have run away.

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