Whale vertebra?

[Forest Cat]

Switzerland, near Zermatt. Zermatt is also a huge glacier.

Someone found a 1300 year old ski in a glacier, in Renheimen National Park. I thought that was a little funny when I saw it, of all the things they could have found, of course they found a ski. It`s Norway, it had to be a ski. They also found many 6000 year old arrow shafts, it`s interesting when things are found.

 

[Gerald Wilgus]

Someone found a 1300 year old ski in a glacier, in Renheimen National Park. I thought that was a little funny when I saw it, of all the things they could have found, of course they found a ski. It`s Norway, it had to be a ski. They also found many 6000 year old arrow shafts, it`s interesting when things are found.

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It gives meaning to strapping planks on your feet.

 

[Gerald Wilgus]

Some of the promised local geology, which I will do in dribs and drabs.

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Here's another boulder in the Porongurup Range, and my husband impersonating a famous Greek figure of legend. You can also see the boulders behind him. Because of the age and nature of our granite, the blocks weather like this from the bedrock and then either stay put for a while, or roll downhill etc.

The Porongurup Range was formed when the main West Australian craton collided with the Mawson craton approximately 1.2 billion years ago, forming magma and squeezing it into surrounding rocks to form intrusions geologists call batholiths. The granite in the photo is therefore about 1.2 billion years old. The big bits, like the "floor" Brett is standing on and the Devil's Slide in the background, are called monadnocks - large rounded hills resembling bald heads which remain behind when the softer rocks they intruded into weather away.

A bit of info from Geology & Landforms of the Southwest (Iain Copp, 2001):

Large slabs of granite are commonly scattered over the hills and around their sides. This type of "onion peeling" forms by a combination of continual heating and cooling of the rock's surface (physical weathering) and moisture in cracks (chemical weathering). Mosses and lichens also break down the surface, but at a much slower rate.

Features such as the Devil's Slide mark faults through the granite. Balancing Rock (previous post) is an example of a granite "tor". These form when joints in the granite form blocks that separate from the main rock mass. Over time, the block's corners become rounded by weathering. Sometimes the erosion of supporting material can cause the rocks to roll down the side of the range, finishing off well down in the foothills.

The big difference with West Australian geology compared to European is that it is extremely ancient and has been a comparatively stable landscape for a long time. So these tors have had the time to weather in situ, and I'll point them out in any future pictures from various places around our granite ranges and coastline. They're all over the landscape here.

Nice!
Here in the US everything east of the Mississippi River is haired over by vegetation. The Colorado plateau are where geology hangs out all over the place. Arches National Park is breathtaking. A couple of my favorite spots: Delicate Arch which is at the edge of a giant sandstone bowl, and Balanced Rock.

 

[Callistemon]

That's gorgeous, @Gerald Wilgus.

@Forest Cat, my husband said, "Where is the other ski?"

 

[Forest Cat]

That's gorgeous, @Gerald Wilgus.

@Forest Cat, my husband said, "Where is the other ski?"

It could be a mono-ski. But I'm guessing the other one is still there under something. Someone found something even more exciting a while ago. He was walking across a big field of boulders and stone and saw something sticking up between two boulders. Pulled it out and it was a 1000 year old viking sword in very good condition. That's a little ridiculous, one for the list of things that doesn't really happen. And so exciting and so many questions comes to mind.

 

[Callistemon]

Finding all these things is so exciting - you know, bits of skeleton you've not yet managed to place 100%, bones in the outdoors, mammoth bones even; the fossils Gerald finds, ancient skis and swords, Tollund man etc etc - but they're all organic and/or old... and I kind of despair because as time goes on, the thing that is found more and more out there is modern-day rubbish, and plastic objects that will be around forever without being benign or fascinating...

 

[Gerald Wilgus]

It could be a mono-ski. But I'm guessing the other one is still there under something. Someone found something even more exciting a while ago. He was walking across a big field of boulders and stone and saw something sticking up between two boulders. Pulled it out and it was a 1000 year old viking sword in very good condition. That's a little ridiculous, one for the list of things that doens't really happen. And so exciting and so many questions comes to mind.

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Amazing! Vikings get a bad rap and what people forget are the trading posts that they established. I believe that there were Viking traders in York, England. I have never been to the abandoned Viking settlement at L'Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland. The first trans oceanic settlement in the Americas.

 

[Crossbreed]

Compared to the above image, it looks like a partial mandible...

 

[GafferGragz]

Please do, it's so much fun when people talk like they're having coffee and cake together!

Cool, my type of people, I'm absolutely all over the place. No biscuits?

Its a bit intimidating with so many knowledgeable humans, but as I learn new stuff all the time, me and Wikipedia (for when my noggin start to give bleeping noises) are game.

Do the hubby partake in other Herculean efforts?

 

[GafferGragz]

Vikings get a bad rap and what people forget are the trading posts that they established.

The Vikings was from Scandinavia (obviously) and was already back then separated into groups, so by large the Norwegians and Danes was into the more conquer type of 'trade' and the Swedes more into trade of goods. But its more diverged than that ofc. From mid Norway iron was hauled through russia to be traded in Byzants (at a scale so large that iron export from Norway didn't surpass it for 500 years).

And by all evidence, scandinavs on viking was absolutely horrible.
Fun fact, I have the red beard/body hair trait, so back in time one of my grate-moms was an Irish or Scottish frille.

 

[Callistemon]

Do the hubby partake in other Herculean efforts?

Yes, @GafferGragz, we invent silly stories for fun, like here but I think we've scared people off by posting that on this forum. It is very niche...but we're forever making up things to amuse ourselves, and we're both writers (also of serious things; before the pandemic I spent ten years regularly writing for two Australian independent magazines on topics including effective passive solar house design, sustainable land management, good nutrition etc). We've also built our own house, climbed such mountains as exist in Australia, and hiked up to 25km a day, at one point doing 200km in two weeks, when we were a bit younger and had more free time...

What about you?

 

[GafferGragz]

Bike cycling (typically 50-70 km). And walking, and off-piste ski walking, you know stomping around gawking at nature and Earth.
But a bad choice of mate, one income, and stress and whatnot with work and house, kids got damaged from divorce, for sure Asperger didn't help, my joy petered out like a dying candle. Have not done anything for many years. Burnout basket-case

 

[Callistemon]

I'm sorry to hear that, @GafferGragz. One problem with life is having to make major decisions quite young and with little experience. So pretty much everyone ends up coming unstuck in some way or other at some point (or many ), although quite a few people make a facade behind which they hide all this stuff so they can look "respectable" and "together" and all that - sort of like airbrushing on Instagram. I think it's better to be honest about these things, but it's not fashionable. However: No reason not to try to live honestly anyway.

Fun hobbies you list! I hear Scandinavians are very outdoorsy culturally. Even find it normal to swim in really cold water...

 

[GafferGragz]

I'm sorry to hear that

Fun hobbies you list! I hear Scandinavians are very outdoorsy culturally. Even find it normal to swim in really cold water...

Thus is life.

Well, you know, I been to more civilized places, like England and Holland. You walk 100 paces and are guaranteed to find people to have fun with (you know, in all possible ways) or being annoyed at.
In Norway you can walk 10000 paces and see nothing more interesting to engage with than rocks and firs, possibly a fox or an elk. If you are extremely lucky a cow. Fun hobbies? YES.

Cold water has been tested, not my cup of tea. Sauna and then a 'swim' in the snow, oooh yeaa!

 

[GafferGragz]

in really cold water...

Fun fact! I wear t-shirt, unmentionables, hoody and stubbies down to around -5 deg C, then add socks down to around -10. Then we talk wool and stuff bc its getting cold. I can assure you this is not 'normal' defntly on the short side of the curve.