Geology Trip

May 2002

These are some pictures from the 2002 Geological Society's trip to Quebec City. Unfortunately, my camera's battery died completely, so all these pictures were 'borrowed' from our geology website. Thanks to Chris Gerbi for taking them and posting them on the site where I could get them! To see the actual website go here

The trip was three days long. We traveled across western Maine to Quebec City, then south a bit to the Thetford Mines, then back across Maine. We stopped at outcrops all along the road to see what was happening, and what we witnessed was basically a cross-section of the Appalachain mountains.

	At the beginning - volcanics. We all clustered around outcrops like this and the trip leaders, Marty, Doug, and Chris, would ask us what we thought was goin on. We'd discuss what we saw and then see how it fit into the geologic time frame and type of activity we were looking at.
	Marty sharing his knowledge. That's me with the bad highlights and my back to the camera.
	Looking at the Kineo rhyolite. Ben, Amber, me, Marty, and Corinne, from left to right
	Doug's turn to share his thoughts. He and Chris knew the most about what was happening because our trip was a condensed version of one that these two had designed for highschool science teachers to go on. My highschool chemistry teacher actually did go on it, and she loved it.
	Making the observations list - At every stop we'd write down type of rock, age, and other descriptions in our field notebooks. As in the previous picture, that's Doug holding the whiteboard and myself and Amber looking on.
	A snowy, chilly lunch at the Attean pluton. It was May 18th and it was actually snowing.I was not too impressed. To make matters worse, this was about the time that I realized my camera was dead. We were only a few hours into the trip facing an incredible view and my camera was DEAD. gRRRRRRRRR
	Camping in Québec. It was sooooo cold!!! That's my big funny yellow tent in the immediate foreground.
	This was at the limestone just above Montmorency Falls in Quebec City. There were tons of fossils and we were all looking for the nicest ones to take home.
	Amber wants a good fossil
	Corrinne, Benjamin, and Amber combing the limestone.
	This is at the base of Montmorency Falls. We worked late the first day, almost until sunset. Then we parked the van and went to St. Patrick's Pub in the old city for some dinner. I think this picture was taken at about the same spot as where I ate a piece of shale...
	The second morning, just outside of Quebec City. There were some really pretty layers of arkose and red shale.
	Randall has a close look. His older brother was on this trip and he brough Randall to try to convince him to major in Geology. Does anyone know if it worked?
	Picture-perfect quartz crystals. These were probably formed in a tiny air pocket during metamorphosis. Shhhhh...... guess where most of those crystals are now.....
	Pillow Basalts!! This outcrop consisted of squiggly bulbous rocks that are created when lava erupts in the deap ocean. Once again, it was FREEEEEEEZING!!!!!!
	Thetford Mines. This thing was HUGE! It was an asbestos mine. I got some awesome chunks of serpentine from across the street.
	No, I am not trying to kiss the rock! I'm looking at it through my handlens, and you have to get really really close with those things. This was a very confusing breccia with partially rounded green and grey fragments in a largely purple fine grained groundmass.
	Cathedral Pines Campground, back in Maine, and a nice campfire to warm our cold, aching bones. From left to right you can see me (biting my nail??), Amber, Ben, and Randall.
	We saw a moose!
	By Day Three, most of us had given up on the note-taking. That's Corinne, Randall, and Ben.
	"Gneiss Ride". If you were a geologist you'd get it. Ha.
	"Conglomerate Cruiser". Corinne's statement - the last one was mine. We spent the ride from Farmington to Orono coming up with catchy geology bumper stickers, like "Eat My Loess" (Amber's).
	This is Ethan, Randall's older brother. I don't remember what he was looking at..
	This was the last stop, and it was very confusing. It was a big white and purple outcrop whose origin we couldn't decide on. We were discussing whether it was igneous or metamorphosed sedimentary, and I think we decided it was the latter. All in all, an excellent trip. I plan on going back through and looking at things some more when I have more time to understand them. Anyone want to come with me?