San Juan Mountains
G-Camp exposed me to some incredible things but nothing compared to our jeep tour of the San Juan Mountains. There are no words to describe how incredible that part of the world is. Reality is several orders of magnitude more amazing than the pictures make it look. The scenery was breath-taking, the terrain varied from place to place, and there was just so much to take in. The previous winter was lousy for snow but that meant that we got to go to places that normally would be buried in snow that time of year.
The mountains were full of abandoned mines, one of which is for sale. I’ve got the listing saved so if I ever win the lottery… you can come visit!
We stopped for lunch at Animas Forks, an old mining town. Prior to that we stopped at some lake (can’t remember the name but it is over 1400 feet deep!) that is in a mineral rich area. We didn’t have very much time and I didn’t find anything too crazy but it was such a nice spot.
Our journey took us to a point to over 13000 ft in elevation, through switchbacks, mountain passes, and a road that wasn’t meant for vehicles our size. There was a steep drop off to the left of our vehicles and one of the jeeps suffered from two flat tires. At one point, our jeep got its axle stuck on a rock. It was at this point some teachers were so freaked out that they got off the jeep and decided to walk to the bottom of the trail. Fortunately they were not on our jeep so we did not have to wait for them once we got to the main road. While up in the mountains we did experience a brief thunderstorm with some small hail which was kind of scary since there was no cover. We all lived though. It was a long day but it was ended with a delicious hamburger in town. If you do go for a jeep tour through the mountains, bring plenty of water and a handkerchief (or something to cover your face). Between the dust and the dry air we were quite dehydrated.
Colorado National Monument
To see bedrock that isn’t sedimentary I have to travel for several hours. That isn’t the case in Colorado. You can see igneous rock and then ten minutes later see sedimentary rock exposed at the surface. They’ve got everything.
We spent part of a day at Colorado National Monument and it was another stunning experience. The rocks we would see are part of the Chinle Formation (Triassic) and Wingate Formatin (Jurassic). While here we were exposed to some many excellent examples of key Earth Science concepts: formations called hoodoos which formed due to differential weathering (more resistant capstones sitting upon less resistant bedrock producing these stacks), tafoni (honeycomb weathering), monoclines, fluvial deposits indicating varying stream velocities, trough cross bedding, faulting, the principle of cross-cutting, and so much more! The one example of cross-cutting looked almost identical to a question that was posed on the Earth Science regents a couple weeks earlier. I had to go back and look at the test to see if it was the same rock (it wasn’t).
Carlsbad Caverns
If you want to continue to think that Howe Caverns is a great place to visit, I’d recommend skipping Carlsbad Caverns. Carlsbad blows any of the caverns I’ve been to in New York out of the water. It is so much larger, the speleothems are far more impressive, and there is just so much more to see. Just entering the cave was so much more dramatic. One of the unique things about this cave system is that the dissolution of the limestone has been from sulfuric acid and not carbonic acid. Hydrogen sulfide from rich fuel deposits mixed with groundwater (during a wetter period) to form sulfuric acid which dissolved some of the limestone. This is not how karst features typically form. The cavern is pretty much inactive due to the fact that the bedrock has been uplifted and it is found in a region that is currently dry. There is very little dissolution occurring as well as very little growth. The lack of light made taking pictures problematic so you may just have to go and check it our for yourself sometime!
We spent the night in Hobbs, NM which is a place that I would not recommend visiting. Something about the town screamed stay away! Once I got service I looked it up and Hobbs has a crime rate higher than 91.5% of the rest of the country. You have a 1 in 153 chance of falling victim to a violent crime (1 in 19 is victim of a crime). On our way to dinner we walked past a rock and sitting on that rock was a large knife. Ultimate Beastmaster picked it up and was then warned that he probably does not want his fingerprints on that knife but by that point it was too late! We all survived our visit to Hobbs. That is what is truly important.
The Adventure Continues!