Me and friend on a proper volcano
One of the reasons I tend to be happy is I like to find out I’m wrong about things, because then I learn new things, and that makes me happy, and I’m constantly wrong about things.
Case in point: granite. I’m standing on big galloping humps of granite in Maine and wondering how they got there. Granite, I figured, is metamorphic. There are all these bits and flecks glommed together in granite, and I assumed the only way they got there in one place is that they got smashed together and rumpled up. And there was a lot of rumpling going on. For instance, North America and Africa once smashed into each other and collaborated on rumpling up the towering Appalachian mountain range. So clearly granite is not igneous rock like our own Oregon basalt. Volcanoes in Maine? I think not.
Guess what? Volcanoes in Maine! I had no idea. I was completely igneant about it.
It’s just not the same kind of igneous rock as we mostly have in Oregon. Volcanic activity didn’t write the whole story in Oregon but it dominated the plot line. Our (currently) tallest mountain range came about because the ocean floor shoved itself underneath our shoreline and by the time it had submerged sufficiently—about a hundred miles inland—it was under so much pressure it got stressed out and pooped up a nice string of volcanoes, as one does. That’s not precisely what happened, but it’s a good enough picture for armchair amateurs like myself.
Dave and friend on a proper volcano
So our Cascade range is all big explosive volcanoes, with the cone shape and the showy eruptions, which are ongoing, but about 17 million years ago the place transitioned toward puddly shield volcanoes from which basalt blooped out and blanketed much of the state, to the depth of a mile in places. So, not your big boomers, but a steady, leisurely flow you could outrun, assuming you were here millions of years ago and could keep it up for a hundred miles. Basalt, to my eye, looks like proper lava. And it looks nothing like granite.
But granite was molten once too. Instead of blasting out into the air and cooling quickly, it cools underground in a magma chamber more slowly, producing larger crystals of this and that, and making for a fancier countertop in its final stage. “Okay,” say I, chastened, “it’s igneous rock, but still not exactly a volcano proper. Not in Maine! Just a bunch of magma underground.”
Guess what? Volcanoes in Maine! Big-ass ones too. About 420 million years ago, producing government-issue basalt like anything. Supervolcanoes, they were.
Ayuh.
So learning that made me happy. I’m even happier now, knowing that–finally–I know everything.
I’m sure I would have learned something, too, except I found myself fixated on your friend wearing… well, hardly anything but hiking boots. Yowza! That woke me up!
I will state right now that is NOT Dave, although I have a lovely photo of Dave from the same climb, shirtless. That is someone I met that day and never saw again. He was right proud of himself, which sorta turned me off. Nudity doesn’t turn me off and we all did a lot of that. As Anon says, those were the days.
When I was a kid our family hiked down one side of Cadillac Mountain in Maine into a gorge and then up the side of the mountain again.
We encountered two men in the gorge. One was only wearing shorts and hiking boots and apparently my mom was really struck by him and ever after swore he was actually an angel.
The other guy was fully clothed and had recommendations for how to climb back up and not overly stress ourselves. He was the angel if you ask me.
Your mom was right though. Men are just naturally prettier.
Interesting to see the female view on this. Biologically, women have more secondary sexual display characters than men.
Those were the days my friends…
My beloved Aunt Ellen, upon exiting from a museum visit, would often remark, “I learned so much, and then I immediately forgot it again.” She was known for shocking people, including her husband. One Halloween she stripped naked, put on a trench coat, walked out the back door and tiptoed around to the front, where she rang the doorbell, and when Uncle Richard opened the door, she threw open the coat and declared, “TRICK OR TREAT!”
Richard was diagnosed with a cancer so Aunt Ellen gave him a living funeral. It was well-attended and had music, singing, and heartfelt tributes.
20 some years later, she sadly has passed away but Richard lives on, bewildered by dementia and cared for in a nice assisted living apartment community.
I miss them both.
Now I miss them too!
Takes a LOT of sunscreen . . .
Interesting you should mention that. Nobody did sunscreen then but mountain climbers would put zinc oxide (I think it was zinc oxide) on their faces, so I put that on my cheeks where I usually got burned, and then the whole lower part of my face got third-degree burns with massive blisters and whatnot. Got pics of that too, the next day. Too dumb to recognize that the snow was going to shine that light on my chin.
So a curious person wants to know if said neekked guy used ANY
sunscreen? Owwwwwweeeeeee
That is true: most people are interested in his sunscreen habits.
Is that Dave in both volcano photos?
It is not. The first man will remain anonymous because I only remember his first name. The second is Dave.
But wait — is he the thrower or the throwee?
Thrower. The throwee was our good friend Jim a.k.a. “the miserable little puke.”
There’s a tosser in one of those photos.
I see what you did there! But you have to be a Brit to appreciate it.
So glad you got to the knowing-everything stage (again)! I love both diametrically-opposed states, actually. As, it seems, do you—-I’m so glad you’re out there and still reporting on wonder!
Thanks! Lots of wonder out there, for the ignorant.