Shimmy Through Spectacular Slot Canyons

[Claire.]

Shimmy Through the World’s Most Spectacular Slot Canyons

It begins with a simple crack in the rock on the ground. But add a few million years and that crack opens into a deep winding gorge in the earth, with a narrow path and sheer sides. The crack has become a slot canyon.

Slot canyons—the narrow, tall channels through otherwise solid rock—can be found anywhere in the world, but are particularly numerous in the southwestern U.S. and Australia, where the perfect canyon-forming combination of soft rock and extreme climate collide. It happens like this: the initial crack is covered by a flash flood from heavy rain pooling in a natural wash. The water seeps into the crack, bringing with it rocks, sediment, and other debris that carve a little bit away from the inside edges of the crack. Rain, flood, repeat. Sandstone is most susceptible to this kind of earth carving, but slot canyons can also form out of limestone, granite, basalt and other types of rock.

Read more: Smithsonian.com

[glorybebe]

Our planet is so amazing!  The pictures are so incredible.  I just wish I could afford to travel!

[Totah Dine]

Slot canyons are dangerous especially during the rainy season.  People have died from flash floods when the sky was clear and the sun shining.  It's best to avoid them unless you have someone with you that knows what they are doing. Every year we read or hear stories about tourists being swept away because they didn't know the dangers.