October 1, 2013
I marked one year in the Caribbean by visiting Cuevo del Indio to see caves and petroglyphs in the limestone rocks of the Arecibo coast on a hot and still morning.
Cueva del Indio
1
Category Archives: geology
Boat and Beach Camping on Tomales Bay, 2013
August 17-18, 2013
Arriving at a beach on Tomales Bay by boat and spending the night must go back to the time of the Miwok. Inverness Yacht Club members have sailed, motored, paddled, and rowed to Kilkenny or Marshall or Heart’s Desire beaches for overnights for so long that it’s a hallowed tradition. Continue reading
Sakurajima, an active volcano in Kyushu
December 31, 2011
There’s an active volcano (活火山, lively + fire + mountain) a ten-minute train ride away from Satsuma-sendai. Named Sakurajima, (桜島, literally, cherry blossom island), this formerly island volcano is home to giant radishes, tiny satsuma tangerines, and numerous hotsprings.
桜島は活火山だ。
While Sakurajima continually erupts today, ejecting clouds of ash and smoke, its most recent major eruption was in 1914. Locals knew before the big eruption that it was time to leave: they’d heard stories about the giant 18th century eruption when the islands’ wells boiled, shoals of dead fish washed up on shore, and earthquakes rattled their towns. In what was a rare eruptive event for Japan, home to explosive high silicate lava, Sakurajima belched a veritable flow of lava (溶岩), which covered villages and caused the island to grow, eventually connecting via isthmus to the mainland. The volcano erupts more than daily, spewing ash over Kagoshima-shi in the summer and further south in the winter.
Valley of Fire State Park
December 26, 2011
The road from Zion National Park takes you not too far from a brilliant red collection of Navajo sandstone rocks known as Valley of Fire State Park, close to Las Vegas. While the sandstone in both parks is of the same, 150-year-old formation, the similarities between these two areas end there. While in Zion the inherent majesty of the cliffs and spires dominates; in the Valley of Fire the saturated colors of the tortured rocks are off the charts.
Zion Rock & Gem and cat
December 26, 2011
We stopped at a rock shop to buy huge chunks of quartz and ogle the various exotic metamorphic minerals; as an igneous petrologist I wandered off and was promptly accosted by the resident cat.
Zion National Park: Emerald Pools
December 25, 2011
Unique about visiting Zion in the winter, aside from the park all but empty of visitors, were the cold temperatures: streams of water that are running in the summer months are frozen in time, held in the chilly grip of December.
Zion National Park: Angels Landing
December 25, 2011
After a day spent canyoning in the Narrows, we opted to hike the iconic trail of Zion National Park leading to Angels Landing.
Zion National Park: Canyoneering in the Narrows
December 24, 2011
A conversation with my mother’s college roommate inspired a pre-New Year’s Eve trip to Zion National Park in Utah. While her roommate and her daughter went to New Orleans for Christmas, we decided on the original plan of Zion. We rented a car in Las Vegas and drove up Interstate 15 through Nevada, Arizona, and finally to Utah, where we turned off the interstate and passed the towns of Hurricane, Virgin, Rockville, and Springdale, arriving in a deep river valley gouged out by eons of flowing water. The Virgin River cuts through ancient dense sandstone, carving out a narrow river valley amid the tall red and white cliffs.
Bolinas and Stinson
September 2011
The tiny hamlets of Bolinas and Stinson are still on the edge of my mental map of West Marin; go a little further and there are dragons, expanses of agate-laden beaches, houses with secret passageways and treehouses amid Ponderosa pines, lush gardens, seals hauled out along the lagoon, rushing water that creates cascades as the reef drains, hedges resplendent with passion flower vines, and dentists whose offices give you splendid views across bluegreen lagoon water surrounded by pine trees.
Fuji-san: Shiraito-no-taki (白糸の滝)
September 12, 2011
The great Fuji-san adventure continued: we’d seen the ice caves; now it was time for my final columnar basalt waterfall of Japan: Shiraito-no-taki (白糸の滝). After leaving the lava caves, we drove through the leafy forests and open fields; dense woods and steep valleys of Yamanashi Prefecture (山梨県, “mountain (Asian) pear prefecture”) and onto Shizuoka Prefecture (静岡県, “quiet hill prefecture”).
[iframe src=”http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&source=embed&saddr=%E6%B9%96%E5%8C%97%E3%83%93%E3%83%A5%E3%83%BC%E3%83%A9%E3%82%A4%E3%83%B3%2F%E7%9C%8C%E9%81%9321%E5%8F%B7%E7%B7%9A&daddr=%4035.315125,138.584976&geocode=FSzmHQIdyu1ECA%3BFbXdGgIdkKNCCA&aq=0&oq=Kawaguchik&sll=35.484156,138.670464&sspn=0.190939,0.264702&hl=en&dirflg=d&mra=dme&mrsp=0&sz=12&ie=UTF8&t=m&layer=t&ll=35.484156,138.670807&spn=0.763748,1.058807&z=10″ width=”425″ height=”350″]
View Larger Map
