Chilliwack River Caves

Fail. I did find a cave, a small one, but I only later learned there would have been a much bigger cave higher up. And the other cave I was searching for ... I could not find. I guess the coordinates were wrong. Oh well, it was a nice outing by the riverside. 

I was in Fraser Valley, near the town of Chilliwack and following the river Chilliwack. This area is about 40 kilometers east of Abbotsford, a cheap place where I was staying while waiting for my conference hotel in Vancouver to have free rooms. (See my other article about swimming in Abbotsford's hotel.)

The cave that I was here to look -- the Slesse Creek Cave -- at was understood to be small, but I was surprised how small it was, just maybe an 8-meter hole by the road. It is under a large cliff that rises straight from the road. A bit further to the west from the cave there's a place where climbers climb on the cliff face. 

Still, a nice little cave to crawl into. Slightly muddy, plenty rocky bottom and low ceiling. Which was challenging with my knees that are not in so great shape. Oh well.

But later I learned that there's a bigger cave about 100 meters higher up the steep hill/cliff, according to this link (BrmpMaps) and this discussion (ClubTread). Sad, but on the other hand I would not have had time or energy to climb much that day, and it isn't clear there's a way up easily.

What made the situation difficult also was that there was no Internet in this area, so I could not check pictures or other articles about the cave. 

This lack of Internet turned out to be more serious as I drove couple of kilometers more east to look at another cave, the Chipmunk Caves. There's a very nicely marked parking area by the road for this cave. And one has to walk half a kilometer on paths to the river side where the cave's location was supposed to be. But, I found nothing. Scrolled through the forest back and forth, paths and off paths. Nothing. Not even any rock or cliff that would enable there to be a cave. I also checked the river bank. And the other side river bank, though crossing might not have been possible. Nothing.

Wrong coordinates? Maybe. Again, not having the Internet lead me to not be able to look for other coordinates. So I drove back to work and back to my hotel.

More information:

Slesse Creek Cave link that I learned about is here (Google Maps). It just pointed to the holes by the road. Chipmunk caves are described here (Google Maps, the link I used) and here (TripAdvisor). There's also information here (AllTrails) and here (AWalkAndALark).

Coordinates for the Slesse Creek Cave are  N 49.077442 W 121.710871. And the claimed coordinates for the Chipmunk Caves are N 49.105453 W 121.640650.

Slesse cave:

Slesse cave area. Here you can see the beautiful river, the climbing area, and some of the other cave-like holes:

Chipmunk caves area photos are below. Here you can see how well the parking was marked! But again, it was impossible for me to find the caves. Thick forest, beautiful forest, beautiful river, but ... no cave. 

Read more urban exploration stories from theurbanexplorer.net, and other underground stories from planetcaver.net. Read the full Planetskier series at planetskier.net, or all blog articles from Blogspot or TGR. Photos and text (c) 2024 by Jari Arkko. All rights reserved.