A Day of Exploring Caves

We had heard of Victoria cave before which is up in the hills around Settle but had never explored this area before. So the other Sunday it turned out we had a free day so at the last minute and this is where we decided to head to.

A quick look at the map and I located the caves and plotted a rough loop out for us to follow using the O.S map app on my phone.

We arrived in Settle around 10 am not early but not late either, it was rather quiet and there was plenty of parking in the main car park we had chose to park in. Interestingly you can pay for a ticket for overnight parking this applies to HGVs but we are interested to know if its possible to stay in the camper here and make a weekend of it in the future. Maybe a future blog post will let you know if we manage to do this.

After a quick visit to the toilets, we got our walking boots on, checked the bags and ensured Coben was wrapped up warm and fastened in safely in his carrier and off we set.

We walked through the town centre past many cafes and the famous Ye Olde Naked Man Cafe , the market square was pretty full with motorbikes the cafes seem to be a popular meeting point for biking friends and clubs to catch up before after or mid ride also many cyclists were about too. We followed the windy streets and quirky houses to the start of the bridleway which heads quite steeply out towards the scars and hills rising above the town.

It is quite a climb and a good workout especially with an 18 month old on your back! A few short breathers were had on the way up ………. to take in views obviously ! We crossed a few fields until eventually reaching a road where we headed east onto a byway, this opened up with great views with Pen y ghent in the distance and not before long we sighted the first destination Jubilee cave.

However upon reaching the exit point of our track our way out was obstructed by a group of cows. We don’t like cows due to previous experiences there so unpredictable and clumsy plus we had Mika with us and with Coben on my back, we didn’t fancy our chances of making a quick escape or ability to jump over a wall if we needed to. Luckily there was a desire line to our left which would take us round them and looked like it would bring us above Jubilee cave so off we went. Unfortunately we came across a stone wall with a stile built into it, upon first appearances it didn’t look doable for Mika, however upon closer inspection the steps were a bit larger than we first thought but we did need to give Mika slight lift over. With this obstacle completed we then ascended a short little scramble. Upon reaching the top we then realised that we couldn’t get out of the field we were in where we needed to due a wall and fence. Things were not really on our side on this walk.

We had to continue on to the next field and cheekily cut across off the line of the footpath to a gate which luckily was unlocked, this then put us back on the track to lead us to Jubilee cave.

Down to jubilee cave we went which proved quite exciting, there are two caves here one which is a tunnel which you can venture inside for 10 to 20 metres Coben loved this one ……we were on a bear hunt! 🙂 No bears were found this time in case you were wondering. The other cave is larger with little nooks to venture into and explore if you dare!

We then found a spot to sit down and have our dinner along with a hot chocolate to warm us up, this was made with the jetboil which I have been meaning to take with us on a hike for a while now. I will be doing a review after a few months of using it so look out for that.

After we had eaten and drank our hot chocolate we then followed the track down to the more popular cave which is named Victoria cave. Some of the fascinating facts about this cave is that the bones of Rhinos and Elephants were found here and also a bear was found to be hibernating here and in amongst the animal bones of reindeer was an 11,000 year old antler harpoon point, the first evidence for people in the Yorkshire Dales. Pretty amazing it is worth taking the time to read about the history here.

Upon climbing the path towards the cave we could see why it is the most popular one with its wide mouth and deep cavern inside waiting to be explored. There were a few people already here and Coben was getting cold and not very happy so we didn’t hang around long to explore further, but that will be another day as we will be back.

I had also wanted to explore some of the scars about and discover more caves but again there’s another full day of adventuring to be done here in the near future and maybe a cheeky wild camp.

We followed the path descending down below the scars and back towards Settle, the closer we got the view opened up showing us the the surrounding fells and Settle itself before we started descending down to retrace our path back into town. We wandered about and did a bit doing a bit of window shopping and explored the streets before getting back to the van and heading back home.