Foxholes entrance collapse cleared - April 2025
Foxholes is a series of low bedding caves found underneath the cliff mid-way between Ingleborough Cave and Trow Gill. Hundreds, maybe thousands of cavers must walk past every year destined for the larger potholes up at Gaping Gill. Some may have heard of Foxholes, but few will have visited.
Despite being of little interest to sporting cavers, these small caves are archeologically significant, having yielded a number of important finds. They are also hydrologically interesting as Foxholes likely represents a historic resurgence for Ingleborough Cave. In 1993, the Northern Pennine Club dug a connection to Ingleborough Cave (the Clapdale Crawl), which led to the need to install a gate. This crawl has since completely silted up owing to occasional flooding which backs up into the lower of the Foxholes caves in the most extreme conditions.
In March 2024 we heard that the slope above the cliff had collapsed into the entrance, completely blocking it. With the archeological and hydrological significance of this site, we decided that CNCC would take a proactive role in trying to reopen this, which would require quite a bit of work both physically, and to arrange SSSI permissions.
With permissions in place, work was performed on Tuesday 8th April 2025, in glorious spring sunshine, by a team of CNCC's conservation volunteers including Alan Wylie, Pete Bann, Ged Benn, Terry and Chris Devaney, Rowan Worsman, Martell Baines and Andrew Hinde. This had actually been planned as a two-day exercise but in the end the work to clear the collapsed material was completed in just one day. Thank you also to Pete Monk and Jeff Keaton, who had signed up to help on the second day but ended up no longer being needed… Sorry about that!
The entrance gate is now accessible again, and any BCA members can arrange to collect the key from Ingleborough Cave. We don't expect anyone to be rushing there, but we're nonetheless pleased to have restored access to such a historic site. Thank you to the team for an excellent effort.