Upon embarking on my first field season in 2011 my knowledge of Liberia was limited to say the least. Watching “The VICE Guide to Liberia”, reading Tim Butcher’s book Chasing the Devil, and multiple inoculations for an array of infectious diseases left me questioning what I’d let myself in for. However five field seasons later, […]
The Namaqua Metamorphic Complex forms the western end of the Namaqua-Natal orogenic belt (see the bizarre granitoids of Natal here). These rocks were formed during the formation of the supercontinent Rodinia which was assembled roughly 1.1 to 1.0 billion years ago. This metamorphic belt reveals the guts of a collisional orogen. If we were to […]
A sand sea or erg is defined as an expanse of land covered with 125 square km. The Namib Sand Sea is the second largest in the world. It covers nearly 80 thousand square kilometers (nearly the size of Austria or South Carolina). From the mountains to the dunes to the ocean, it is home […]
For most geologists, thoughts of South Africa are comprised of kimberlites, chromite seams, and gold. This post has nothing to do with any of those things. Along the east coast of SA near Durban is a suite of Mesoproterozoic granitoids and high-grade metamorphic rocks called the Natal Belt that were emplaced during the collision of […]
