Sliding open the door this morning Daito bounded out and I was grateful for the awning keeping him penned in. This is only the 2nd or 3rd time ever putting it up, in 10 years of owning the van but even just those few times ive been grateful for it. The extra space is luxurious when the van is so small.
After a lazy breakfast Aimi and angus took of walking to Clapham – no, not that Clapham – a small village down the valley. I waited with the others to give them a head start before we drove over to meet them. Poor Nala’s hips are getting old and Kayto doesnt walk so far anymore so we can spare them part of the walk.
Arriving in Clapham, we found a beautiful Yorkshire village of small stone houses bordering a wide shallow river tumbling down the hill. Quaint little stone bridges hop over the river, worn smooth by hundreds of years of foot traffic and thick trees overhung the path taking us back in time as we walked up to the caves ticket booth.
As we reached the front of the line, I responded there were 5 of us to the clerks enquiry. Presented with the card machine, my hand involuntarily stopped for a second, hovering, as i was told entry would cost £87.50!! For entry to a path and a cave! I took a personal moment to just swallow and pay, for the sake of a harmonious holiday.
It was a pleasant walk up the valley, in amongst the trees and beside a mill pond. There was even a ram-pump chugging away which was cool to hear in action, even if we couldn’t see it. But arriving at the cave kiosk my disbelief at the price turned into a (mostly) silent seeth when the staff didn’t check us for tickets. I mean, if you’re going to extort money from us to look at naturally occurring rocks, at least pretend to check our tickets and restrict access to those without… this is the sort of enraging tourist trapping I’d expect in overtly corrupt countries like Africa or Mexico, not Britain!
But parking that aside, we stomped into the caves and enjoyed the cool curves of the water worn stone. As we followed the path deeper into the hillside I had to admit the underground landscape was incredible. This was also the first cave that Daito had ever entered. He was very excited and a bit nervous of the echoing but was probably grateful of the drop in temperature.
Given a laminated sheet of information, I acted as our tour guide, putting on my best 1950’s British infomercial accent. (The ticket price didnt even include a guide….) Pomposity echoing around us, I described the rock features and history of the cave at various intervals. After a while we reached a narrow section where the ceiling was very low. We had to sort of squat and walk in a long line thru this section till we reached a more comparable section of cave deeper in. The abrupt change in rock type or density that led to this was invisible to us, but the water that eroded this path found it over centuries.
We took some time to get some interesting photos at the end before we made our way back. My favourite one is of tiny stalagtites getting slowly consumed by moss. It looked like an abandoned micro city being taken over by vines, nature reabsorbing the urban landscape.
Back outside and a short ice-cream break later we took the circuitous route back to the village – not passing any ticket office i might add. Had we come this way to start we could probably have gotten in for free… not that I’m bitter about it. The path took us up a short steep section of hillside with a couple stiles that the big dogs completed with zero grace.
It was a decent descent back to Clapham with some gorgeous views. Some bikers confirmed my suspicion it would have made a great mountain bike route. In another life.
At the bottom of the hill we rejoined the river and sharing it with a heron we watered the dogs. This is when Mike arrived after his long drive up to meet us. A coffee break and chinwag in the sun round off a very pleasant trip out. We took off back to camp and met others go to the shops for food.
Back in camp Daito was still being very fussy with food. There was just so much going on he couldn’t really relax, always on guard. Living on our own he hasn’t really been exposed to small kids playing so it was really interesting for him to watch them run around. In the end, even after being out all day walking, I took him for a tour around the campsite and focused on discipline. I think this really helped as he knew what to do for once that day and really focussed.
On the way round, we reached a family who’s mother was overcome by how handsome Daito is and wanted to fuss him. We stopped and the whole family gathered around and he did me proud by doing all his tricks and being very good saying hello to them all.
The rest of the evening was filled with chatter and pizza around the firepit Kai and Laura had brought with them.