Greetings!
I'm reading much about the origins of Australia geologically (surprise), and some recent ?drilling research, craton aging, and theory alignment has me comparing the results against what we are seeing in the gorges and rock sediments around us.
Most of Australia is seabed that only rose above the surface about 55 million years ago when the continent took shape as a result of three cratons (super magma chambers) colliding. The southwest area around Perth, northwest Kimberlies, and the central Ayers rock region all came together and created a huge Andes-like mountain range about a billion and a half years ago just as the earth spent 600 million years under miles of ice. That ice and glaciers reduced the mountains to an inland sea which gave the continent it's two huge sandstones deserts between the cratons. The eroded seabed sandstone plateaus were carved into the massive gorges we've been cruising through, and the vast remote grassland cattle stations we've been driving across.
It'll be nice to fly over to eastern Australia where the largest organism in the world lives, and came into existence before the continent even rose from the waters.
To see the photos taken at the Bitter Springs creek (a lateral warm spring full of water from the last wet season), click on: Sunday, Oct 2nd.
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