ShowCaveBlog

Norwich is said to have the UK’s largest amount of subterranea, mostly medieval, vaulted cellars. Norwich Heritage Economic and Regeneration Trust (Heart) has commissioned a researcher to explore them. The goal is obviously to make them available to the public. This may include both, an underground sight open to the public, and online documentation of closed cellars. During the annual Heritage Open Days there were tours through a small section of the cellar, which were very popular. However, it seems the extend of the cellars is almost unknown, and there are a lot of rumors, for example one telling of a tunnel from the Cathedral to St Andrew’s Hall, which monks are supposed to have used to go and do inappropriate things with women. Such stories are fun, but they are rarely true…

We have several listings of cold war bunkers which are now museums or tourist sites. But a bunker sold for private use on eBay is new.

Underground nuclear bunker in Derbyshire Dales sold on eBay for £20k | Metro.co.uk

This is so impressive, a beautiful underground place, so we had to write about it. Unfortunately it is not open for the public. So we decided to give at least a glimpse of it on the blog.

Norman and Norah Stone from San Fransisco are obviously very rich, and – among art aficionados – famous collectors of modern art. It seems they still had several millions of dollars after they spent a fortune on modern art, did not really know what to do with this money, and so they burned it by building a private art museum, not open to the public. Changing exhibitions reflect the continually growing collection of the couple.
However, we are more interested in the fact that the whole structure is located underground, inside one of the numerous caves in Napa Valley, California. Generally the caves are used for the Californian wine, which is grown in the valley. But this cave is dedicated to art. The Stones hired three young New York architects – Tim Bade, Jane Stageberg and Martin Cox, of Bade Stageberg Cox. The only thing visible from the surface is the entrance and the exit, both framed in Cor-Ten steel which will soon rust and become almost invisible. The inside has a size of 540m² and  consists  of a  35m long main hall with several smaller rooms branching off. The underground museum  is called stonescape.

The cave is located at the weekend home of the couple, a 70,000m² property, with a modest 1887 farmhouse, a vineyard, a stand of redwood trees, a sculpture by Cady Noland, and a pool and pavilion designed the artist James Turrell and the architect Jim Jennings.

• Art collector couple builds museum-size cave in Napa for collection
• Insider Art

Showcaves.com has to do with underground. But we never heard the voice of the underground, other than in a metaphorical way. London Underground has a voice, and her name is Emma Clarke. She is a award winning BBC comedy writer and the freelance voiceover artist of the London Underground. It is her saying the famous Mind The Gap.

If you tested this link, you might have gotten a 404 error. The reason is simple, Emma Clarke told an interviewer lately she “…wouldn’t want to travel on the Tube and hear my voice over and over.” While that is easy to understand, the interviewer didn’t, or at least shortened it until the article contained the formulation that she didn’t take the Tube because she didn’t like it. As a result she was fired, or – as she was a freelancer – will not get more assignments. The story could end like this, but now the power of the internet arose, her dismissal has sparked an international media frenzy and her website recieved nearly 90,000 yesterday, which caused the collapse of the website.

We will see if London Underground will reinstate her as the voice of the Underground. However, we would recommend to wait a few days and then hear the spoof Tube announcements on her website.
Ticket to Rile? Furor as London Underground Makes Space for New Voice

It seem the Brits find their caves inadequate. So they build more. At Aireville Park, a new adventure centre which will cost £2 million is constructed at the moment. It will include a life-like cave with water and squeezes.

The center is intended for school groups any sportive people like cavers and climbers. It would allow training in caving in a relatively safe environment.

We understand the advantages of such a training location, but we guess it will not reduce the number of cave accidents. Probably it will increase them, as people who managed the fake will try to do the real thing… However, time will tell.

Image: the artist at work: a Guanche drawing the exceptional geometric patterns. This is not the real cave but the model in the Museo Canario in Las Palmas.

The Cueva Pintada is not Altamira, it is just a small, mostly artificial cave in volcanic tufa, in which the indegnious inhabitants of Gran Canaria, the Guanche, painted enigmatic geometric patterns. Nevertheless they are breathtaking and absolutely unique. After the Spaniards conquered the islands, the native population was either killed or assimilated. The cultural remains were not valued, cave houses were used for goats. Later this cave was opened to the public. But fortunately it was then closed. Thats not really nice for tourists, but at least it protected the site.

Now, after 24 years, the painted cave is reopened. The whole area, with the excavation of a whole village, was restored and integrated into a museum. The cave is now also part of the museum. It is possible to see the cave through glass from the museum, but not to enter.

Inauguration of the museum was on Wednesday 26-JUL-2006.

Cueva Pintada

The longest tunnel in the world is built in Switzerland at the moment. It is called Gotthard Base Tunnel, as it is intended to avoid most of the ascend and descend by going through the base of the Gotthard massif.
There is a certain demand of the public to have a look at this exceptional engineering work, so the AlpTransit makes regular guided tours into the tunnel for groups, and there is a open day every year at each entrance.
The year 2005 is an important milestone, as the tunnel is now half completed. The next half is estimated to take 10 more years. So in 2015 the first trains will use the tunnel.

More info on showcaves.com