The state department got the memo that their trail sucked and fixed it.
no lie
no rock falls
no devils club
no feeling of death and despair by its users
instead, it was nicely redone, and even came with a new sign!
Anyway, we met with our grad students who were going to teach us about glaciology and rocks. Here are some fun facts:
.01 million years ago - latest ice age in Puget Sound
.03 million years ago - mt. baker as we know it was formed
.03 - .05 million years ago - ptarmigan ridge & black buttes formed
1.1 million years ago - Kulshan Caldera was formed
4.4 million years ago - Hannegan Caldera was formed
35 million years ago - Cascade Volcanic Arc was formed
90 million years ago - Terranes of non-native rock transported by faults to N. Cascades
1600 million years ago - oldest existing rocks in N. Cascades
so, the reason im just putting in this quick timeline is to show you how wacked out this placed is. And by that i mean, there are so many rock types, formations and miscellaneous whatnot in the North Cascades that it's a geologists dream (or a grad students nightmare). You look over at table mountain and the area surrounding Mount Baker and you see these amazing basalt columns, remnants of it's volcanic life. Then you look the other way and you see Shuksan that is made up of a completely different rock type called Schist.
Just to clearly display some of the different rock types and how my mind is completely blown right now, here are some general explanations that will hopefully clear everything up for you (but mostly for me)
yep. totally makes sense.
No comments:
Post a Comment