Some members have expressed interest in a weekend trip, so the following has been arranged:
All day Saturday 29 June 2024 and half-day Sunday 30 June 2024
The Girvan-Ballantrea Complex: Ayrshire coast
Excursion leader: Conn Gillen (University of Edinburgh)
Geology
This will be an opportunity to examine and discuss an ophiolite complex – diverse Ordovician age rocks from the mantle and ocean crust, juxtaposed by faulting. Ophiolites are quite rare. Other ophiolites are in Cornwall and Shetland, so the Girvan-Ballantrae area is definitely our nearest! I expect we’ll examine Silurian strata as well. The origins and histories of these rocks are complicated, but our leader, Conn, is familiar with guiding various groups here and has also offered a pre-trip Zoom briefing. Attendees can get involved with the geological intricacies or take a more introductory approach and admire the excellently exposed rocks that we’ll see, such as pillow lavas, layered chert and so-on.
Background information can be found online. There’s an introduction at: https://www.geologynorth.uk/ballantrae-ophiolite-complex/ More detailed references with geological information will follow with confirmation of your booking.
Practicalities
Attendees need to be ready to start on the Saturday and Sunday mornings. Given the distance from Cumbria this means that arrangements need to be made for Friday night and Saturday night accommodation. (Dates and timing have been governed by low tide conditions). Attendees might want to share transport and accommodation and will need to make their own arrangements. Details of some accommodation suggestions will follow on confirmation of booking. The aim is to have about 15 attendees with individual costs of £20 to cover any possible CGS outlays.
A moderate amount of coastal / foreshore walking will be involved. Stout footwear and weather gear will be needed, as for most of our field excursions. Conn will provide more guidance on topics such as fitness, walking distances, parking / meeting spots, loo stops, potential lunch stops, etc in due course. Attendees will need to use their own vehicles (hopefully shared) to get to start points.
At present there’s no fixed plan for meeting up socially on the Friday or Saturday evenings – this might be fun and is something that can be considered nearer the time (or on the spot).
The excursion is expected to end around lunchtime on Sunday 30 June. Attendees may wish to use the afternoon for more exploration of the Ayrshire coast (seal spotting?!) or for their return trip, or they could extend their stay of course.
Booking details
In view of the need to book up accommodation soon, if you are interested in the trip please add your email address via the form together with payment of £20 to CGS trip account with ref BALLAN Name; Sort code 20 18 47 ; Account No. 90207128 by 2 February 2024. Bookings will be on a first come first served basis. Should the trip not be viable deposits will obviously be returned.
Any non-members who wish to attend, please join the society prior to registering.
Form to Book a Place
Phil Davies, CGS President
Next Events for 2024
Wrynose to Blea Tarn The Langdale Caldera Margin
Monday, 16 September, 2024
Leader: David Haselden
• Meet at the Blea Tarn National Trust Car Park (NT on map) (NY 2956
0432) to consolidate car use, discuss the weather and decide whether to go up the Crinkles or do this alternative to the Crinkle Crags Excursion in the event of low cloud.
• We will head up to the Three Shire Stone (M on map) for 10h00 and set off towards Teighton How (NY 27736 03273)
• None of the walking is on well defined paths and much is over open fellside, boggy in places. The descent from Blake Rigg to Blea Tarn is steep and only partly on a weakly defined path.
• The excursion is approximately 5km in length with ~300m of ascent and ~450m of descent.
• The excursion finishes at Bleaberry Knott, but if time allows other aspects of the area may be included on the way back to the NT car park at Blea Tarn
2024-CGS-Excursion-Register-Wrynose-to-Blea-Tarn-Langdale-Caldera
Wrynose to Blea Tarn Langdale Caldera Comp
A table has been booked at the Cassa Bella restaurant in Keswick for 6 people including the speaker before the lecture. We are now unable to book a large table together so if anyone wants to organise booking their own table there is an easy online booking system at www.casabellakeswick.co.uk The booking form has a ‘Notes’ box so it might be worth filling it in to ask for a table near the table that’s already booked for the Speaker. (Quote the Booking Reference R7NR4N for 25/09/24 and RPNR4B for 09/10/24 in the name of David Steele from 17.45pm) Depending on the positions of the tables we are given on the night it may hopefully work out that we can all chat together.
The basal unconformity of the Carboniferous-Upper Devonian, Northwest England
Wednesday, 25 September, 2024
Speaker, David Boote
A table has been booked at the Cassa Bella restaurant in Keswick for 6 people including the speaker before the lecture. We are now unable to book a large table together so if anyone wants to organise booking their own table there is an easy online booking system at www.casabellakeswick.co.uk The booking form has a ‘Notes’ box so it might be worth filling it in to ask for a table near the table that’s already booked for the Speaker. (Quote the Booking Reference R7NR4N for 25/09/24 and RPNR4B for 09/10/24 in the name of David Steele from 17.45pm) Depending on the positions of the tables we are given on the night it may hopefully work out that we can all chat together.
Marginalia of the Northumberland-Solway Basin in North Cumbria and Scotland
Saturday, 28 September, 2024
Leader: Steve Rozario
2024 CGS Excursion Register Solway Basin
2024 CGS Event Information Solway Basin
This excursion is based on the BGS publication “Geology in South West Scotland”
Edited P. Stone, 1996, and is an abbreviated version of Excursion 1 – Langholm and Canonbie.
iv We will be visiting locations 3, 4 and 6 from this excursion guide. There are full geology notes for the locations in this guide, available free online, which are not reproduced here.
Penton Linns
Logistics
Location 1
Meet 10.00 for 10.30 Charles Street Car Park, Langholm, Grid reference
NY 362 844, Postcode DG13 0AA
Langholm is on the A7 north of Carlisle, just over an hour’s drive from Keswick. From Keswick take the A66 east towards Penrith, join the M6 heading north at junction 40.
Exit the M6 at junction 44 and take the A7 north towards Longtown. Stay on the A7 past Longtown until you reach Langholm. Just after the narrow single lane section in
the town centre bear left and then turn left to reach the Charles Street car park.
Refreshments and toilets are available in Langholm town centre where there is also free short term disk parking. Pelosi’s Corner café is recommended for early arrivals
or those wanting a late breakfast.
We will assemble in Charles Street Car Park at 10.30 for the 2 mile loop walk to Skipper’s Bridge (there is no safe parking for a group of cars at Skipper’s Bridge, and
the riverside walk is pleasant).
At Skipper’s Bridge we will look at exposures of the Silurian greywacke basement, presumed to extend under the Northumberland-Solway Basin, the basin margin fault and early Carboniferous Birrenswark lavas from the extension-rifting phase – the birth of the basin.
We aim to return to Charles Street Car Park by 12.30 for the short drive to Penton
Bridge.
12.30 to 12.50 drive to Penton Bridge.
From Charles Street Car Park follow the one way system round to rejoin the A7 turning right to head south. At the traffic lights at Skippers Bridge turn left on the B6318 towards Penton. Follow the B6318 taking care to turn left at Claygate and then left and right at Harelaw where the road descends to the Liddel Water. There is
parking for 3-4 cars in the layby on the left before the bridge, and for several more cars on the roadside on the right past the bridge.
Location 2
Penton Bridge, Grid Reference NY 432 774, Postcode CA6 5QU.
12.50 to 15.50 we will explore this scenic geological SSSI to look at the Carboniferous Yoredale cycles, with fossiliferous limestones, mudstones, siltstones,
sandstones and coals. We will also explore the basin inversion fold and faults visible here. We will have lunch en route.We return to the cars at 15.50 for the short drive to Canonbie.
15.50 to 16.00 drive to Canonbie.
We return on the B6318 to Harelaw where we turn left on the B6357. We pass through Rowanburn, with it’s visible coal mining history. On entering Canonbie we
turn left at the signal-controlled bridge before crossing the River Esk signposted Canonbie churchyard. Follow this road towards the church, turning right at the
cemetery where there is parking for several cars. If this parking area is full there is more parking on the other side of the bridge in Canonbie at the village hall.
Location 3
Canonbie Church, Grid Reference NY 394 763, Postcode DG14
0RA.
16:00 to 17:00 we walk past ‘Dead Neuk’, scene of a tragic ferry accident in 1696 when 28 church-goers were drowned in a flood, and along the riverside. On the far
bank we can see Permian desert sandstones, the post-basin deposits.
We continue along the river bank to a small bluff where there is an exposure of late Carboniferous red-beds (the Canonbie Bridge sandstone). These are described in a
relatively recent BGS report “The stratigraphy and sedimentology of Upper Carboniferous Warwickshire Group red-bed facies in the Canonbie area of SW
Scotland” Jones and Holliday 2006.v These rocks are “probably typical of what covered most of northern England prior to late Carboniferous folding and uplift”
vi according to the British Regional Geology guide to Northern England, so represent the final deposits in the Northumberland-Solway Basin.
i https://doi.org/10.1016/0012-821X(78)90071-7
ii https://doi.org/10.1144/gsl.sp.1989.044.01.20
iii https://webapps.bgs.ac.uk/Memoirs/docs/B06816.html
iv https://earthwise.bgs.ac.uk/index.php/Geology_in_south-west_Scotland:_an_excursion_guide.
v https://nora.nerc.ac.uk/id/eprint/7191/1/IR06043.pdf
vi https://earthwise.bgs.ac.uk/index.php/Warwickshire_Group,_Carboniferous,_Northern_England
Exploring the evidence for Snowball Earth in Scotland and the North Atlantic region: a tale of Late Precambrian ice ages
Wednesday, 9 October, 2024
Speaker: Mike Hambrey
Larvikite – a unique Norwegian rock
Wednesday, 11 December, 2024
Speaker: Alan Smith
AGM: Himalayan Geology
Wednesday, 12 March, 2025
Speaker: Danny Clarke-Lowes
