#106 Jun 2015 This OLD Earth of Ours!

Gros Morne National Park takes you so far back in time that it’s incomprehensible. Hundreds of millions of years of tectonic upheaval are visible.

Turn around and you see the effects of ice ages only tens of thousands of years ago.

The Tablelands attracted our attention as we drove to the Discovery Centre. What are these orange mountains?

Tablelands rocks originated in the Earth’s mantle below the oceanic crust. They are part of the Appalachians, which we have encountered since the state of Georgia.

 

The Appalachians are part of what was once a huge continuous mountain chain that stretched for 4,000 km through eastern North America, Great Britain and Scandinavia. On the western side of the Appalachians are rocks of ancient North America, on the eastern side are rocks of Africa, and squashed in between are remnants of the Iapetus Ocean.

St. John NB Reversing Rapids are part of this upheaval. See our post #103.

The rocks of Gros Morne National Park formed in different parts of the Iapetus Ocean basin, hundreds of kilometres apart. They were moved into place as the ocean closed.

Sometimes known as the Accordion Effect, continents have repeatedly collided to form supercontinents, then pulled apart again and created new continents and oceans.

It was an awe-inspiring feeling to walk on the Earth’s Mantle.

At a distance the Tablelands appear to be a desert.

On closer inspection many of the rocks have a serpentine or snake like appearance.

 

Even in this environment dandelions persevere.