Stump Cross Caverns owner auctions home to raise £200k for attraction

The popular caverns were badly hit by the pandemic and Lisa Bowerman has put up her one-bedroom apartment, on Church Street, to raise funds to restore specialist lighting in the caverns, which will cost £200,000.

The auction opens on March 17 at noon and has a minimum starting price of £170,000 and bids will need to be submitted by the end of the month.

Lisa told the Nidderdale Herald: “Carrying out the essential maintenance on the caverns means so much because I’d like them to be restored for our future generations.”

A crowd funder was opened last year for the apartment but Lisa had a change of heart, given the war in Ukraine.

“We are still Crowd funding but we have also put it up for auction on purple bricks,” said Lisa, who last year turned cavewoman to live underground at the attraction for 105 hours to raise money.

“It seems wrong to be encouraging Crowd funder at the moment with the war.

“We are so lucky in many ways, so we decided to edge our bets to see what would work first to enable us to relight the caves.

“If the Crowd funder is not successful, then everyone would automatically get there monies back.”

Lisa, who has run the family business for the last 18 years, said: “We love welcoming visitors to the caverns and will do all we can to ensure this wonderful place is kept open for future generations to enjoy and to keep local people employed.”

Purple bricks said: “The auction of this unique property presents a great opportunity to support the maintenance of much-loved local attraction, Stump Cross Caverns.”