Peter the monkey, 17, entered the record books yesterday by being the first man to visit the molten centre of Earth in a vessel described as “an giant iron potato”. He returned a hero to his homeland of Wiltshire where he was greeted by a man from Guinness World Records and a cheering crowd.

It wasn’t all fun and games and comedy capers, though. Peter had been sent on a reconnaissance mission as part of the Wiltshire Subterranean Federation’s ongoing project of mapping the land under Britain. The scientist leading the project, Professor Gary Gaylord, explains how the project came about: “I was cooking a potato one day and just thought “Wouldn’t it be great if that potato was massive and it had a monkey in and then we sent that to the Earth’s core.” That was two years ago, and it just sort of went from there really. Normally, the WSF only go down a few hundred metres, so this was a real project for us. Getting Guinness in hopefully helped raise awareness for the work we are doing every day beneath Britain’s feet.”

“A voyage to the Earth’s core may come as a shock to many”, continues Professor Gaylord.” It’s a common misconception that the core of the Earth is really hot. In reality, it is no more hot than maybe two or three microwave ovens. I blame science fiction for this misunderstanding.” The temperatures inside the Earth’s core vary from 400°C to 700°C depending on season.

Professor Gaylord intends for there to be more voyages to the Earth’s core and hopes to go there himself one day. He encourages young people to get involved and visit the Wiltshire Subterranean Federation’s Web-site here.