Geology Trip

We live near the border of Oman and went for a drive through the mountains there. The drive was not initially intended to be a field trip, but I did ask Kyle to bring some books along. He brought a Rock and Fossil book and a Geography book. During the drive we decided to make the trip a geology outing. We stopped along the way several times to analyze the rock formations. We stopped at an old coral reef, now high and dry, that has a number of fossils. We didn't go on a full fossil hunt, but just photographed the old reefs and looked at the structure. We then stopped at an interesting outcropping with clearly defined vertical layers. We climbed around it some before getting back on the road. Our next stop was a wadi, a dry river bed. The walls of the wadi are over twenty feet high and are a good example of water erosion. We also found some nice smooth rocks to contrast nicely with the jagged rocks we usually find in the mountains.

Our drive took us up into the mountains and it became difficult to stop, but along the way we talked about the different formations we saw. It would have been nice to have a real geologist on the trip with us, as my knowledge of geology is limited to Geology I twenty years ago. The drive through the mountains is pleasant. They are now paving what used to be an off-road route. This makes the trip easier, but opens the mountains up to more tourist and more traffic. As a reward for Kyle's hard work, we ate at the hotel in Hatta, the town at the end of the mountain road.

Kyle created a photo slide show of our trip. He choose the photos (with some input from me, or every picture would have him in it) and added transitions between the photos.

Note: It took Kyle a few months to complete this post. The writing has been slow going, but now he is more motivated. The post does not include the slide show. Writing next to a picture seems to work better. It gives him a static visual reference for his writing.