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31 October 2012
A few folds from Betty’s Bay
Here are a few folds in the quartzites of the Cape Fold Belt, exposed on the mountainsides of the Harold Porter Botanical Gardens in Betty’s Bay, South Africa. Hillside #1: Zooming in closer: Annotated (bedding traced out): Hillside #2: Zooming in on summit region: Annotated (bedding traced out): Zooming in on the central portion of the hill: Annotated (bedding traced out): The Cape Fold Belt – there it is!
27 October 2012
Salt crystals in a tidal pool, Hermanus
Last winter, around 10 months ago, Lily and I were walking along the shore of Hermanus, South Africa, when I saw a little closed-drainage pool in the sandstone, harboring a briny distillation of the South Atlantic Ocean. Neat salt “rim” on the edge of the pool… Also note the ~cubic crystals at the bottom of the pool. Super, eh? Supersaturated….
26 October 2012
Friday fold: South African gneiss
Another Friday, another fold. …By another Bentley!
19 October 2012
Friday fold: Pofadder shear zone mylonites in 3D
Christie Rowe sent me these two images. They were taken by Ben Melosh and Louis Smit. The folded layers are mylonites of the Pofadder Shear Zone in South Africa. I love it when folds are expressed not only in profile, but also in three dimensions. Nothing in life could possibly be better. We’ve featured the Pofadder Shear Zone’s folded mylonites before – and that time, too, they came from a …
5 September 2012
Structures in the quartzite along the coast of Hermanus
Grab your coffee and join Callan & Lily for a stroll along the quartzite cliffs of Hermanus, South Africa. Bedding, cross-bedding, joints, faults, veins, folded veins, and faulted veins all await you there in the morning light.
25 May 2012
Friday fold: Pofadder shear zone
The Friday fold “guest fold” series continues with a folded ultramylonite from South Africa.
24 May 2012
Swimming with great white sharks
This is Dyer Island, off Gansbaai, southern South Africa, a little west of Cape Agulhas: Those are seals, a huge, crazy crowded colony of Cape fur seals. They are loud. They create a God-awful stink with all their fishy excrement. It was like being in a BBC nature program to see this firsthand. I could hear David Attenborough’s voice in my head, raspy and accented: “Dyer Island, South Africa. Home …
29 March 2012
New year’s atop Lion’s Head
My first view of Lion’s Head, the little butte northwest of Table Mountain, came through the fog on the morning that Evelyn and Jackie took Lily and I to Sea Point to see the migmatite: A lofty pinnacle – made of the same flat-lying quartz sandstone as the mesa of Table Mountain to the southeast: We went back to Lion’s Head on New Year’s Eve. After a delicious Thai dinner, …
27 March 2012
Tafoni weathering of Malmesbury Group turbidites
Some tafoni (pattern of little weathering pits) expressed on Malmesbury Group (~700 Ma) turbidite sandstones at a little outcrop on the eastern shore of False Bay, South Africa: That last one seems to have some concentric layering to the tafoni pits – exfoliation? Spheroidal weathering? Hmm…
26 March 2012
Malmesbury Group sediments on the eastern side of False Bay
In December, Callan found an outcrop of Neoproterozoic-aged turbidites in South Africa, on the eastern shore of False Bay.
Callan Bentley is Associate Professor of Geology at Piedmont Virginia Community College in Charlottesville, Virginia. He is a Fellow of the Geological Society of America. For his work on this blog, the National Association of Geoscience Teachers recognized him with the James Shea Award. He has also won the Outstanding Faculty Award from the State Council on Higher Education in Virginia, and the Biggs Award for Excellence in Geoscience Teaching from the Geoscience Education Division of the Geological Society of America. In previous years, Callan served as a contributing editor at EARTH magazine, President of the Geological Society of Washington and President the Geo2YC division of NAGT.