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Wednesday, 17 March 2021

North Wales Underground! Caves, Quarries, and Mines

Well, North Wales is already beautiful on the surface! There are forests, mountains, hills, woodland, beaches, cliffs, marshes and just about anything else you can shake a stick at.

But what about the underground?

We are pleased to tell you that underneath the surface there is a whole new world of underground secrets, ready to be explored. In this article, we will show you our top picks of subterranean attractions. Of course, we must stay safe, so only travel when it is safe to do so and take care of planning your trips and explorations.

Llechwedd Slate Caverns

What do you get when you combine history with adventure? As with many places in this ancient region of the world, you don’t have to choose! Llechwedd is set in a mine in the heart of Snowdonia. You can experience several different adventures here, namely, the Deep Mine Tour, as well as the Quarry Explorer. The Deep Mine Tour is an adventure that has a fantastic underground setting and includes the use of AT technology to provide an educational adventure. You’ll be accessing the caverns using Britain’s steepest cable railway down to levels of 500ft underground! The quarry explorer on the other hand is an off-road adventure that takes you through mountains and valleys carved by man and machinery over the years.

Sygun Copper Mine

This is a Victorian copper mine that closed in 1903, but this isn’t the end of the story as it was bought and renovated by the Amiens family as a tourist attraction in 1986. Sygun copper mine was once the main supplier of minerals in all of the wales. It is located about one mile outside of the village of Beddgelert, in Snowdonia National park. 

Mining in the area began its life in ancient Roman times, with small scale tunnels into the area of mineral veins – of course then the dark ages came and these were left untouched up to the industrial revolution when the tunnels were dug down deep into the hills. Today, you can explore these amazing copper mines on a tour of this underground wonderland. There is also a museum of welsh mythology and history. This has one of the largest art collections of any privately controlled museum in all of Great Britain.

The Great Orme mines, Llandudno.

This craggy and historically important place is home to the Great Orme mines. This was uncovered in 1987 and was found to house the oldest mining system in all of Europe! Dating back to the bronze age, it was found that it contained artefacts from over 3500 years ago. You can visit this amazing place for yourself via the visitor centre and tour – a chance to see some authentic Welsh history!

Go Below

Go below is based in Snowdonia, and offers several different adventures, all of which features hours of mine exploration. Including zip lines, cave climbing traversing and abseiling, all on the subterranean crags of this incredible mine system.

Bounce Below

This is owned by the zip world brand and features a gigantic underground trampoline system, here you can jump up and down – all underground. There is even an underground zip line. Amazing!