After preliminary investigations by Glyn Edwards and Eddie Edmondson in Waterfall Chamber, Pippikin Pot, it was decided to try to get up to the previously unrecorded high aven inlet at the end of Waterfall Chamber, and so gain access to any passage that may be at the top. The shaft is fairly large, being about 20' in diameter and, as we later discovered, about 100' high.

A few weeks later, Glyn, John Bowers, Andy Walsh and Budge descended Pippikin Pot to Waterfall Chamber. The bottom of the rift is too tight to allow anyone to get into the shaft at floor level, so Glyn climbed up the rift to a ledge about 15' up, put in a stemple and hung a rope down to enable the others to climb up. We traversed along the rift to the bottom of the shaft, but to scale it would have entailed a long, nasty bolting job as the walls are sheer and wet. We traversed back to the ledge and Glyn started to climb up the rift. Some of the climbing was artificial and was made harder by loose rock and, for the first 15' or so above the ledge, slimy mud on the walls. Themud indicates that the sump in Waterfall Chamber backs up to a height of about 25' at times, one of the times it chose to do so was when we left two enpty tackle sacks on the ledge. These were washed off and one was never recovered.

Glyn reached a ledge about 50' above the others and waited there for John to prusik up to him before continuing. After several incidents with rather large lumps of cave falling in their general direction, Andy and Budge (who were getting rather cold and fed up with just sitting around) de-rigged Pippikin to avoid any more bits of falling cave and left John and Glyn climbing. Due to a very remarkable piece of coordination (a rare thing in the Pennine!) Andy and Budge rigged the entrance pitch of Link Pot just as Glyn and John arrived at the bottom. They had managed to get to within 20' of what appeared to be the top of the climb and thought they could see a passage continuing at the top.

When John, Budge and Glyn returned, there was much evidence of recent flooding in the lower streamway (several parts of which had been sumped off) and Waterfall Chamber. Glyn completed the climb and gained access to a small chamber, roughly circular, about 20' high and 10' across. A climb into the roof of this chamber led to a narrow rift that ended abruptly after 25' at the top of the shaft at the end of the rift in Waterfall Chamber. A fairly large (walking size) passage could be seen on the other side of the shaft but the only way to reach it was by bolting or a mad pendule so we sought a way of bypassing the shaft. Thrutching up the rift into a bedding, a small chamber above the shaft whose floor seemed to be nothing more than jammed boulders, was reached. A flat-out bedding led from this chamber right across the shaft top to the passage on the far side. In order to fit into the afore-mentioned monstrosity one has to dangle 2/3 of one's anatomy out of it and into the shaft. Not being able to decide which 2/3 to dangle, Budge lined Glyn and John across. They returned after about ten minutes and reported that the passage forked almost immediately. The left hand branch was narrow and wet and didn't seem very keen on going anywhere. The other passage led to a chamber about 30' high, at the top of which could be seen a bedding. The stream came out of a narrow passage about 15' above the floor.

The final trip was made by a cast of thousands who dragged lots of tackle down with them so that they could ladder the 40' pitch in Low Streamway and the 90' climb beyond Waterfall Chamber and thus see what we were doing. As soon as we reached the climb Glyn prusiked up and hung a ladder down to enable everybody else to climb up - everybody else then promptly decided not to bother having a look after all and they all went out without taking any tackle with them, leaving a very disgruntled party behind, namely Glyn, John, Budge and Simon Farrow. The latter three joined Glyn at the top of the climb and while Glyn and John went across the traverse to start climbing in the chamber Simon and Budge started surveying. The two inlets proved too tight and another roof passage seen needed bolts to reach it.

On our return we had to leave a couple of ladders and a rope behind in Low Streamway. The reasons for this are several - several people went AWOL leaving vast amounts of tackle behind and no-one to help lug it out and we couldn't manage it all. At the court-martial held later we said that they took it down and left it so they should go back down and get it and they said the same about us. Consequently no-one went back for it out of principle. After principle gave way to common sense, a party went down to retrieve the tackle, but it was too wet. After that we sort of forgot about it until we were reminded by several rather annoyed people a few months later, by which time it would have been half way to Leck Beck Head, so that was that. Oh well, there's a moral in that.

M Burgess.