Underground Yorkshire cave hides a waterfall twice the height of Niagara Falls

North Yorkshire is full of amazing places to see, including a cave with a hidden waterfall that’s twice as tall as Niagara Falls.

This secret spot, found deep in the Yorkshire Dales, is one of the biggest underground chambers in Britain. It’s a famous landmark, though it’s closed to the public for most of the year.

The cave is so huge that it takes a whole minute to reach the bottom, and it’s big enough to fit York Minster inside.

Image credit: Photo © Andrew Tryon (cc-by-sa/2.0)

The main chamber of Gaping Gill is 129 metres long, 31 metres high, and 25 metres wide, making it one of the largest and most detailed cave systems in the UK.

Most people get to the cave by walking from Clapham, past Ingleborough Cave and up the slopes of Ingleborough.

The cave was formed thousands of years ago when water from the Fell Beck stream carved its way through the rock. The stream flows from the side of Ingleborough, which is the second tallest mountain in the Yorkshire Dales at 2,373 feet.

Image credit: Photo © Andy Beecroft (cc-by-sa/2.0)

Because the cave is so tricky and deep, it’s usually only explored by very experienced cavers. A man named John Birbeck from Settle tried to go down into the cave for the first time in 1842.

He redirected the stream and was lowered into the cave by farm workers using a rope, but only made it to a ledge 58 metres (190 feet) down. That ledge is now named Birbeck’s Ledge.

These days, the public gets the chance to visit the main chamber just twice a year, when the Bradford and Craven pothole clubs set up a winch to safely lower people into the cave.

Remember - LeaveNoTrace!

As with anywhere outdoors, kindly keep these areas pristine and wild by taking all trash with you. The amount of complaints we have seen since the pandemic is crazy. It's really not that hard to take your rubbish with you!

Litter tends to spread, so if you see any and are able to pick it up and dispose of it outside the hidden gem, it will help keep the area tidy.

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