THE LIMESTONE SCENERY OF THE INGLEBOROUGH AREA

THE LIMESTONE SCENERY OF THE INGLEBOROUGH AREA.

Your day visit starts in the village of Clapham. Take a look in the Yorkshire Dales National Park Exhibition right by the main car park.

MAP OF ROUTE FROM VILLAGE TO BAR POT.

map.gif (47807 bytes)

"LIKE BEES ROUND A HONEYPOT"

So many people visit Clapham it is known as a honeypot site.

Look at the number of businesses in Clapham that are associated with tourists.

1. List or map the cafes, guest houses, hotels and gift shops in the village.

2. Find out the origin of visitors by either asking if you can use the addresses in the visitors book in the National

Park Exhibition or by looking carefully at cars in the car park and use the garage stickers or tax discs to see where they have come from.

THE NATURE TRAIL - 1.

There is a small fee to walk through the Nature Trail up to Ingleborough Cave. Please respect this special woodland area.

The Nature Trail was set up in 1970 to mark European Conservation Year and to commemorate Reginald Farrar who collected plants, especially rhododendrons from China, Tibet and Burma between 1914 -1920.

INGLEBOROUGH CAVE - 2.

The entrance to the cave was discovered by the local landowner in Victorian times, he was called Reginald Farrar. Just inside the entrance was a huge natural barrier behind which was a large lake, with care Reginald and his friends removed the barrier and the lake was drained to allow access to the caverns within. The caves have been formed by water slowly dissolving the limestone by a processes called carbonation. Weak points in the limestone such as joints and bedding planes have been enlarged to form a network of passages linking swallow holes to caves. Much of the work was done by meltwater from the four ice ages that have occurred in the last two million years.Inside the cave there is evidence of very powerful streams surging through the cave. Scallops on the walls show where boulders and stones were swirled round by the force of the water. It is calculated that the water was flowing at at least 150 mph.

Carbonation - all rainwater is very slightly acidic and as it passes through the soil it collects more acids from plants. This water then percolates through lines of weakness in the limestone and slowly dissolves small amountsof Calcium Carbonate . As the water drips from the roof of the cave it redeposits small crystals of calcium carbonate called Calcite. Over thousands of years the calcite deposits build up to form stalactites hanging from the ceiling. It is calculated they grow at about 1cm every 1000 years. As drops splash on the floor they build up small mounds called stalagmites.Occasionally a stalactite and a stalagmite will join to form a pillar.

STALACTITES HANG ON TIGHT TO THE CEILING AND STALAGMITES MIGHT REACH UP FROM THE FLOOR!

STALACTITES HAVE A 'C' IN FOR CEILING. STALAGMITES HAVE A 'G' IN FOR GROUND.

The Victorians gave the formations fanciful names like "The Shower Bath", "The Elephant's Legs" and The Curtain Rail"

mites.jpg (87650 bytes)

tites.jpg (86938 bytes)

In this photo you can see the "Skittles" a collection of stalagmites.

In this photo is a flow stone called "The Mushroom Bed" and some stalactites.

FELL BECK - 3.

The stream that comes out of a small cave next to Ingleborough Cave is called Fell Beck. It is a resurgence or reappearing stream. It comes back to the surface because the geology changes from limestone to an impermeable rock. Once it used to flow through Ingleborough Cave but it now flows through a passage underneath the cave and comes out to one side. Even now after heavy rain and melting snow Ingleborough Cave can flood and the river flows through the cave and out of the main entrance.

TROW GILL -4.

Trow Gill is a spectacular gorge like feature with steep sides of massive beds of limestone funnelling to a boulder strewn rocky stairway at the top end.

There are two theories as to its formation:

1. A Collapsed Cavern.- The boulder strewn stairway is in fact the entrance to a former swallow hole which led underground to a cave. The roof of the cave collapsed leaving the gorge as we see it today.

2. A Dry Valley. - At the end of the last Ice Age in periglacial times there were vast meltwater streams. These streams didn't sink underground through the limestone rock because most of the rock was still frozen and behaved as if it was impermeable. This meant the meltwater streams cut valleys into the rock and then, when the rock thawed out, the river disappeared underground through lines of weakness in the limestone leaving a dry valley behind.

BAR POT AND A LIMESTONE PAVEMENT - 5.

Bar Pot is a swallow hole . This is where a joint has been enlarged so much by carbonation and river processes that it swallows a stream which disappears underground into a cave. Today Bar Pot is dry and the stream has disappeared down another swallow hole further upstream. This swallow hole is the famous Gaping Gill. Next to Bar Pot is a small stretch of limestone pavement. During the last Ice Age the top soil was scraped off to expose the top surface of the limestone. This area of flat, bare limestone divided up into large blocks called Clints separated by vertical cracks called Grykes (Grikes). Carbonation has slowly widened and the joints in the rock to form these grykes. In the grykes many rare plants can be found growing like the Hart's Tongue Fern and Solomon's Seal.

On the surface of the limestone pavement are little hollows and runnels formed where the slightly acidic rainwater has collected in depressions on the surface and slowly dissolved them. Limestone Pavements were formed over many thousands of years but can be destroyed within hours. Farmers and landowners have used the rocks for building dry stone walls, recently many were dug up and removed to use in garden rockeries! Now they are protected by laws like The Limestone Pavement Order which prohibits the removal or disturbance of limestone. Some pavements with rare plants are designated as Sites of Special Scientific Interest.

GOING FURTHER - 6.

If you wish to go further you can visit the spectacular Gaping Gill, a swallow hole so vast the whole of York Minster would fit inside or continue and climb to the summit of Ingleborough Hill, one of the famous Three Peaks.