Two more different rocks than granite and marble would be difficult to find: Together they form the rocky basement of the Abel Tasman National Park and determine its natural features, from drainage systems to coastal erosion patterns and forest types. At the peak of one of NZ great mountain building periods, about 115 million years ago, a vast mass of molten rock rose into the surrounding rocks. It slowly cooled and solidified and is now known as Seperation Point Granite. Massive forces have tilted the park’s rock basement into the sea. The overlying rocks have been stripped away, leaving the distinctive, coarse-grained granite to resist the sea between eroding shorelines of Golden and Tasman Bays. It now forms the parent material for most of the park’s soils and commonly weathers into boulders, giving the riverbeds and and coast their distinctive look …
The kids didn’t see the marble and granite, just glittering stones and seashells one could pick up and take home :) In the following: Pictures from our walk to Apple Tree Bay from Marahau, some of the pics show Sandy Bay, others Tinline Bay, Coquille Bay or Guilbert Point, the islands showing up nicely in the background are probably either Adele Island or Fisherman Island, depends.
couldn’t resist a little overcreative-tonemapping on this one :)
