Stock photo of rays of sunlight streaming through the forest near Virgin Falls along the Tofino Creek, a transition area of the Clayoquot Sound UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada.
Virgin Falls, one of the area’s most well-known features, emerges from an underground stream on the south slope of Little Chestnut Mountain, drops 110 feet (34 m), and vanishes underground again. The source of the water for Virgin Falls is Virgin Falls Cave. The lower mouth to this cave is located approximately 150 feet upstream from the lip of the Falls. Virgin Falls Cave trends roughly southwest for 3,000 feet before ending in a massive ceiling collapse (breakdown). The cave stream easily flows through this breakdown, but no passage through the breakdown has been discovered. The cave itself is mainly one very large (30 feet wide and 40 feet high) stream passage. At the base of Virgin Falls, the water flows approximately 10 feet and falls into a large pit, the entrance to Virgin Falls Pit. At the bottom of this pit, the water follows cave passages and emerges as a spring at the base of the Cumberland Escapment