Road Trip! - Cheddar Gorge

After spending a very relaxing night in Thorbury Castle, we set off for our next destination - the Cheddar Gorge. A very narrow road runs through the gorge connecting to a cute little village at the bottom. Highlights in the area include rock climbing, "adventure caving", and hiking along the rim of the gorge. Unfortunately, the weather wasn't the greatest while we were there, so I had to steal this picture of the gorge from another website.


During the worst of the rain, we took cover in the caves. Cox's cave was the smaller of the two we visited, but still very impressive due to the many reflection pools found inside:


Seeing a break in the rain, we decided to try to do a little hiking along the rim of the gorge. After climbing 274 steps and hiking very muddy mile and a half we were rewarded with views down through the mouth of the gorge and into the city beyond:


Our hike also provided an opportunity to see lots of local wildlife including this grumpy old man:


And this adorable little baby:


Once the rain inevitably started again, we ducked into Gough's Cave, a huge labyrinth of rooms which seemed to go on and on without end. We stuck to the path, but there was a local company that offered "adventure caving" deep into the maze of rooms. Not exactly my cup of tea!

Even on the main path we were able to see calcite "waterfalls" formed by prehistoric rivers:


And amazingly huge rooms like this one (the picture really doesn't even come close to showing how far back this cavern went!


While in the caves, we also able to tour rooms that were historically used for aging cheese. These rooms deep in the cave were perfect due to their constant temperature and humidity. As you might have guessed, Cheddar is the village were cheddar cheese was first produced!

Despite a pretty nasty day for weather, we were still happy to have had the chance to visit this neat little spot in the UK. Jason and I even agreed that we were quite happy to have a bit of rain because it meant that we pretty much had the entire place to ourselves!

Next stop: Lynton & Lymouth