An 11-hour walk with 825m of uphill is not everyone’s idea of fun, me included. Don’t get me wrong. I can do it -I’ve walked up to 30km a day on long distance hikes in the UK in recent years, but the UK is a lot flatter than BC and it’s considerably more relaxing because there’s nothing big and snarly that will eat you. So, the unsettling prospect of the day’s climb was nagging away at me as we pulled into the Takakkaw Falls car park, near the town of Field, BC, at 7am on a fine August morning this summer. The lot was empty, darkly waiting for the tour buses and the instagrammers with their perfect outdoor clothes to come and gawp at the falls through their phones.
One of the first rocks I bought when I first fell down the rabbit hole of rock collecting is a genuine, 100% space rock – a lovely piece of the famed Campo Del Cielo meteorite strewn field in Argentina.
The last thing most people would put on their Xmas list is “Dear Santa, please could I have an active volcano in my back yard”. For sure there’d be advantages: A built in BBQ that could handle pretty much any size of steak, and I wouldn’t have to pick up after my dog’s back-end eruptions (the last big clean up, which thankfully my wife did, clocked in at 29 “deposits”). Aside from that and the free orange light show, it’s hard to see any real benefits to rivers of lava squashing the Hydrangeas.
One of my bestest favouritest rocks is a ventifact (pictured below). It sat on my office desk in downtown Vancouver for the last 4 years and was terribly neglected during lock down, so I brought it home last week to make it feel loved again. It now sits under my computer screen next to a 1kg cube of tungsten metal and a small brass cock. (As an aside, the tungsten cube is unbelievably dense – the same specific gravity as gold at about 19.2).
It’s the size of a small brass cock.
Ventifacts are naturally polished rocks that have been shaped by wind-blown sand or ice, typically in desert environments -a process known as as “corrasion“; a new technical word for me, which just goes to show you’re never too dumb or too old to learn. They’re found in deserts all over the world from Antarctica to Egypt and have even been recognised on Mars where they’re suspected to have damaged a wheel on NASA’s Curiosity Rover. The term -which loosely translated from the Latin means something made by the wind- first appears in the literature around 1911; a British geologist coined it to describe wind-shaped rocks he saw in Africa and parts of Asia.
I was fondling my rocks the other night -something I do often- gently touching them, stroking each one, talking to them like the fine old friends they are. My collection is growing, so mid Covid I bought some rickety, white Ikea Billy shelving to show off the best pieces in my home office, where nobody can see them but me. Mid-caress, my eyes were drawn to the 3 sulphide specimens perched on the top shelf which has begun to sag worryingly under the weight of sexy, coloured rocks.
Billy is groaning.
They’re 3 of my favourite samples: very different visually but closely related chemically. There’s some eye candy pyrite from Huanzala in Peru, a particular favourite; a wonderful chunk of arsenopyrite from Kosovo, and some meaty looking yellow-orange orpiment I collected in Iran. They represent points on a chemical spectrum with iron sulphide at one end, iron-arsenic sulphide in the middle and pure arsenic sulphide at the other end. Pyrite has cubic crystal structure, and orpiment and arsenopyrite are both monoclinic – an off-kilter matchbox shape.
At this point, the mineralogists out there will nerdily tell me that it isn’t that simple you idiot, and they’re right – there’s all sorts of pressure/temperature/chemical considerations that influence which mineral forms and when- but I like to think of them as a simple spectrum.
Every geologist has experienced extreme isolation at some point; a moment when they realise that if anything bad happens to them right then and there, they’re screwed. They may as well be on Mars because no help is coming. For most geos, isolation is a regular Saturday night thing when our one “friend” -the one that stills listens to our no-please-not-again hilarious field stories -is unexpectedly busy taking care of their incontinent senile aunt. Would you believe it?I’d love to meet up, but I have to change Auntie Mabel’s diaper. Gosh is that the time…bye…
Yobs
Soccer fans -like my mate Neil- often experience isolation at away games when they accidentally stray into the local Ultras’ bar and come face to face with 65 drunken lunatics sporting matching death head tattoos. I’ve been there. Forty years ago (gulp) on a field trip to Dorset me and 2 fellow geology students were the target of a gang of skinheads in a pub itching for a kicking; but I digress, that’s not where I’m going with this story. I was curious about the concept of loneliness and separation so I polled some industry friends of mine for their recollections of those peculiar flashes of intense isolation. Here are a few of their stories; a big thanks to everyone who told me a tale.
Very tough geologists in Dorset looking for skinheads to chase.
Stuck to a stained, gray padded seat in the speaking hall at yet another retail investment conference, the guy in front of you is falling asleep as the presentation on the main stage goes totally off the rails. It goes so badly wrong, dragging on for minute after endless tooth-achey minute, that you’re praying for lightning to strike and end the speaker’s misery. The irony is, the speaker kicked off by telling you that they’re going to present a very brief overview of what their company is up to -you know, just the highlights…the steaky sizzle…
A stained chair.
Bad corporate presentations are a missed opportunity for companies. The weird thing is, having paid thousands of bucks for a brief 15 minutes to pump their Tier 1 project, the way some companies present you wouldn’t think they gave a damn. Apparently, Mr CEO is doing the audience a favour by mumbling incoherently for 25 minutes, 10 minutes over their allotted time, eyes cast down at the monitor screen as their complex technical slides bludgeon the audience to a slow death. There are usually dozens of companies presenting each day, so you’d think they’d maybe want to make an effort to stand out, right?
Ilkley Moor is a small, windy, heather-covered hill in Yorkshire in northern England. It’s due north of the old textile city of Bradford, in the heartland of the coal-fired industrial revolution. At just over 400m high, the moor is home to grouse, sheep, bilberries and hordes of local tourists who jam the small car parks up by the Cow and Calf pub near the top. It’s been occupied for thousands of years -the hill, not the pub- and is dotted with Stone and Iron Age sites including an ancient Neolithic swastika carved into a rock on top of the moor. And don’t forget the Twelve Apostles – a dozen prehistoric standing stones arranged in a henge-like circle on the top.
The spa town of Ilkley and verdant Wharfedale, seen from t’moor. Ba ‘eck.
Can tha’ sing ‘owt?
But in Yorkshire folk lore, this inconsequential hummock carries true weight. Mention its name to a born and bred Yorkshireman and I guarantee he’ll start singing. Eyes filling with warm, nostalgic tears, the holy words “On Ilkley moor baht’at” will spring forth from his lips set to a simple, familiar tune that all Yorkshire folk learn in their mother’s womb. He’ll then explain to you with slow gravitas that the phrase means “On Ilkely Moor without a hat”. Awe inspiring stuff. While most patriotic English people can sing along to (bear with me here) Sir Edward Elgar’s orchestration of Sir Hubert Parry’s gorgeous musical setting of the mildly insane William Blake’s classic poem, Jerusalem -which ponders whether Jesus briefly created heaven in the heart of industrial England- Yorkshire folk prefer to sing about small hills and hats.
High up in the mountains of northeast Türkiye -up where the borders of Georgia, Türkiye and Armenia meet- the terrane is alpine and rugged. The spectacular scenery is underlain by highly prospective volcanic rocks; the tell-tale rusty signs of possible sulphide mineralization scattered all over.
The first time I went up there I was with 2 other geologists; a pleasant, easy going Turkish chappy who I’ll call Ahmed, and an annoying German one who I’ll call Harald. Harald had strong opinions about bloody everything and wasn’t shy to share them; a stark contrast to Ahmet who was happy to be learning the exploration ropes from a couple of relatively experienced geologists. He tagged cheerfully along, breaking rocks with his hammer and chucking the better ones into sample bags for assay.
The mountains of northeast Türkiye. Glorious spot.
Bloody Germans
But Harald -good old Harald, every team has one- well, he was a know-it-all who always had a better way of doing things and wouldn’t let an argument die even when his aggravated British colleague was about to give him a good Schlag in the Mund. He also refused to drive the field truck (with hindsight, perhaps a good thing) which added to my workload because as the most experienced off-road driver in the group, the long drives along forestry roads fell to me. Harald aside, I was happy enough. The geology was excellent, the pay was good and the scenery even better, when you could see it through the heavy clouds that often blanket the region.
Apologies for the picture quality in this piece. I can’t get the old school photos out of the old photo album -they’re stuck down firm after 40 years under a sticky plastic film, so I had to take pictures of 40 year old photos.
Reputation: Sheep are stupid, defenceless and harmless creatures that mope about on hillsides doing not very much. They are good for two things: being eaten and producing wool.
Sheep. I like them but I also think they are complete idiots. I like them because a) they’re tasty when they’re young and lamby, and b) they’ve kept me amused through many long field days, providing a welcome low-IQ distraction from having to take notes about boring grey-green rocks in a sodden note book. But they are irredeemably stupid.
Too stupid to get a proper haircut
Animal lovers and cuddly vegans would have us believe they’re sentient, caring, intelligent beasts capable of protracted abstract thought. For example, here’s a glowing report card I found on an animal rights website:
“One example of their amazing intelligence is that sheep are capable of recognizing all kinds of faces. They recognize sheep in their flock and are aware when these sheep are missing. They can recognize “bully” sheep and get distressed when they come around. These sheep can even recognize the person who cares for them and the sheepdog that herds them! If the appearance of another individual is altered, the sheep have no problem still identifying who it is, and they can keep track of over 50 different sheep faces! If you make a sheep mad, chances are they are going to remember you and that event for over two years! Talk about a grudge.”
Oooh. Convincing eh? But I have to ask, have these mutton-loving snowflakes ever met a sheep? Leaving aside my vague disquiet at the the thought of a crew of grudge-bearing inked-up sheep casing my house at night and mugging the dog in the back yard, I don’t buy a word of it. They also claim that sheep have decent enough memories to form friendships and they feel sad when one of the flock is hauled off to Sam The Butchers for its final date with sausage machine. But everywhere I’ve worked, except down a mine -no sheep there, funny enough- I’ve only ever seen sheep, and their close cousins goats, studiously eating grass which is not what I’d call a challenging intellectual pastime. Hence, building on decades of keen science-based observation (trust me, I’m a geologist) I’m now 100% certain that they’re not the brightest knives in the animal cutlery drawer. They’re dumb as planks and the field researchers who call them smart have never actually interacted with a real sheep in a real field trying to do something that isn’t stupid or involving grass.
