This is a glorious, spectacular book. Steinmetz's images from a paraglider provide a unique view of some of our planet's most beautiful landscapes, somehow a link between satellite views and "ground truth." I don't do commercials on this blog, but...
There’s only one major sand dune field on the Colorado Plateau, and that can be found at the Coral Pink Sand Dunes State Park, way down in the southwest corner of Utah, not far from Zion National Park. And are...
This from a University of Ulster news release last month: Some of the world’s best known beach resorts may not survive projected sea level rises, a leading coastal scientist at the University of Ulster has warned. Professor Andrew Cooper, Professor...
There is something of a mystery, an historical debate, about who exactly caused the burning of the great Library at Alexandria. There is, however, no mystery about who torched the library in Timbuktu. Some years back, while researching the Sand...
Blustery. A wonderful, quintessentially English adjective, for quintessentially English weather. “Blustery conditions will continue along the coast for the next few days.” Weeks? Months? Well, it was November when we ventured to the Lake District at the kind invitation of...
In the aftermath of the real super-storm (or hurricane) Sandy, there has been, not surprisingly, a super-storm of reporting, opinionating, blogging, and twittering. This is good – there is, in certain quarters at least, some kind of debate going on....
Living in sand is not easy, and life – animal and vegetable - comes up with all kinds of wonderful solutions for doing so. Perhaps qualifying for one of the more bizarre adaptations is Pholisma sonorae, a perennial herb also...
If it’s cinematic entertainment you want, then I have a couple of recommendations: on the big screen, Skyfall (it delivers entertainment with style and gusto), in the privacy of your own home, Paint by Particle, a stunning epic directed and...
“We cannot sustain the shoreline in the future as we have in the past” Oblique aerial photographs of Mantoloking, NJ. View looking west along the New Jersey shore. Storm waves and surge cut across the barrier island at Mantoloking, NJ,...
When I say “ignored,” it’s not that I pretend that this humble blog has any influence whatsoever on the policies of governments, it simply reflects the fact that the considered and rational voices of scientists who know what they are...
Long ago I became used to meeting someone new and having an exchange along the following lines: And what do you do? I’m a geologist Oh, been on any interesting digs recently? And, when it was determined that a geologist...
Today marks the end of this year’s Earth Science Week. In the past, I have summarised and discussed the “Big Ideas” that have been put together by the Earth Science Literacy Initiative; these are excellent, fundamental, and of global relevance,...
How could I not post this? The activities of our Martian geologist friend continue to amaze, the latest being sand sampling. All images and captions are courtesy of NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS, and the NASA Curiosity website, which describes the image above: First...
So what is this? Land-art on the moon? An alien landing pad in the Utah desert? The work of nocturnal new-agers at the beach? The answer of course, is none of these - in reality more fascinating and bizarre. To...
Apologies for being off-line for a while, but circumstances beyond my control have meant that posting has been a low priority. However, please go to this link for news of what will be a powerful documentary by the award-winning director,...
I was delighted (but envious) when my friend Patricia brought me back a sample of sand from her recent visit to Bhutan. The sand came from one of the country’s most sacred places (and its old capital), Punakha, at the...
It was tempting to make the subject of this entire post the egregious activities of the outstanding American buffoon, Donald Trump (plea to trans-Atlantic readers: if you can’t do anything else about him, could you please keep him away from...
Heralded as one of the finest beaches in the world, Unawatuna lies close to the southern tip of Sri Lanka. The sand contributes to the heralding – on every scale – but this sand must have tales to tell. The...
At a time when there is a great deal of hand-wringing introspection, garishly coloured by the inevitable political posturing and empty but bombastic rhetoric, on what role the US will play as this century progresses, allow me to recommend one....
