Hunt Pot

Following an entertaining mine trip the day before, this was the ideal Sunday potter!

The original plan was for Hunt Pot but as it was such a nice day we started off by abseiling down into the magnificent hole of Hull Pot. Watched by a great number of walkers we managed to find some anchors in the stream bed on the far side and, with the aid of some quality tackle sack rope protectors, descended right over the edge.

After sticking our head into the very aqueous looking actual cave at the bottom, and the fact that everyone was only in under suits, we declared that Hull Pot had been well and truly 'bottomed' and began the ascent.

After more sun bathing and idle chit-chat, it was on to the focus of the day. A short walk over the fell lead to the smaller but still rather impressive Gaping Gill style rift entrance of Hunt Pot. I took charge of the rigging and was soon at the first ledge. A lot of faff trying to decide on the best way to get to the main hang lead to some delays but it was finally done and I hung around for David to come down while I got my camera out.

Having extracted said camera and flash gun in a Tupperware box, I thought it would be a good idea to make sure the camera was attached to my wrist. This done, I looked back to my lap just in time to watch as the flash gun decided it didn't want to wait any longer as it leapt from it's perch. One of those slow motion moments followed as I watched helplessly as the flash gun, box and all plummeted to it's death down the 30m pitch. Bollocks.

Thankfully, it was just an eBay £3 special, however I was more concerned about the £60 Firefly that had gone along for the ride. Maybe it'll be ok I thought. Ha!

Anyway, just then David appeared and after some help with the awkward re-belay, I made for the bottom. After some swinging around in the waterfall I decided I couldn't be arsed with the deviation and went directly to the bottom.

It didn't take long to locate the flash gun, or rather what was left of it. The Tupperware box had exploded in rather spectacular fashion but the Firefly seemed intact! After the others came down I took a few snaps of the spectacular shaft wishing I had bothered to bring my tripod.

Back up for more sun bathing while John and John spent 45 mins de-rigging and taking more photos. Marvellous.