Greg and Julie went on a long hike to some not so spectacular falls (rapids shown below). I pooped out after 2.5k of dodging stones, roots, etc, and hung out at the gift shop (big surprise).
While at the gift shop, one of the workers let me look at a book on the park that described its formation (OK, I'm trying to do this from memory, so bear with me...). Back in the carboniferous era (several hundred million years ago), the whole area was a big delta like the Mississippi, so lots of silty, sandy sediments washed down into a valley. About 100 million years later, that was forming a huge coral reef that stretched up to China and was much larger than the great barrier reef is today. Then, granitic magma began intruding from below, which cracked and faulted the limestone (what used to be the reef), above, and it also uplifted portins of it. Then, that all got compressed by many overlying sediments in the next 100 million years or so, during which time water dissolved and eroded a lot of the limestone through the cracks and faults that had formed.
So anyway, all we could get are some sandstone samples from the old river delta layer, because the limestone caves we tried to access were cut off by barbed wire fences... (sorry Gerry and Yong). Photo of karst below:
We went to lunch at a very nice river resort in the vicinity fo $30 for all 3 of us. Greg had red chicken curry, Julie had tuna salad (for which we severely berated her), and I had a large fried sweet and sour fish.
Have more photos of the limestone mountains, but this stupid photo uploader is acting up now....
Greg and Julie went down to a nearby bar on the beach at night, and reported it was much cheaper than the hotel (of course that doesn't say much...).
The geologic evolution sounds amazing! I liked the karst pict and the bamboo napkin holder too!
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