Snow Cauldrons – two post-glacial cauldrons cutting into the northern slopes of the Main Ridge, between the Elbe Peak and Wielki Szyszak, also known as Snow Pits, Snow Jams or the Eyes of the Mountain Spirit. Their 200-meter-high abyssal walls cut with ribs and gullies make a great impression, at the exit of which there are fans of scree cones. The eastern Great Snow Cauldron is separated from the western Small Snow Cauldron by a rock perch in height 180 m. The bottoms of the boilers are cut off by moraine embankments, the highest of which is achieved 40 m in height. Inside the boilers, in intermoraine depressions, small and shallow Śnieżne Stawki were created.
The relief, mountain ponds and characteristic vegetation create an alpine-like landscape. Large differences in relative and absolute heights (the bottom is located at a height 1175-1240 m n.p.m., and the top edge is approx 1490 m n.p.m.) and exposure of the slopes contribute to the maintenance of a specific climate in the boilers. In winter, snow stays here for a long time and huge snow overhangs form. The walls of the boilers covered with snow and ice are a favorite climbing spot. “Last year's”snow stays here sometimes even until the end of July.
The Śnieżne Kotły (Śnieżne Kotły) is an area where an extraordinary richness of plant and animal species occurs.
The western face of the Little Snow Cauldron is crossed by a vein of basalt, the highest extrusive rock intrusion in Central Europe, which is covered with a unique plant complex. There is an endemic basalt saxifrage here, glacial relic – snow saxifrage and very rare plants, m.in.: alpine scatter fern, alpine goose, skalnica mchowata, tepolistna naradka, mountain rosary, ear break, lion fescue.
The Path over Reglami runs through Śnieżne Kotły (the green trail from the Pod Łabskim Szczytem shelter runs along it” to the Karkonoska Pass).
After passing Śnieżne Kotły, the Main Sudetes Trail traverses the northern slopes of Wielki Szyszak along a stone path (Czech. High Wheel).
Riphean devil, the spirit of the Giant Mountains, which was supposed to scare people wandering into the mountain backwoods. The myth dates back a thousand years and connects with pagan beliefs. This creature is the personification of the unfavorable forces of mountain nature, that threatened a person. Marcin Helwig, creator of the map of the Sudetes, he drew a zoomorphic figure on the slopes of the Karkonosze Mountains, strange creature – cross of the griffin, goat and deer, the Germans called him in the 16th-17th centuries. Riphen Zabel (in loose translation: mountain devil), then Riibenzahl. In Poland, after World War II, the name Liczyrzepa was used by Józef Sykulski, the author of the book "Liczyrzepa, the evil spirit of the Karkonosze Mountains ", Jelenia Góra 1945 r. There is also a folk name for the devil of the Giant Mountains – Turnip. The Czechs simply call it Karkonosze. The Riphenian devil is the hero of hundreds of legends, a character sung in operas, and its myth is investigated by scientists.