Great field day near Cemaes

In the middle of another busy week with lecture preparations and marking, we would do the third excursion of our field trip module. I had been there at the first one on Llanddwyn, but skipped the second one to Rhoscolyn. Now we would do Cemaes. That is a lovely trip! Or at least, the geology is lovely. The trip can still be a challenge, of course. But this time the signs were good: the logistics had been organised in advance (unlike last time), and the weather forecast was chilly but otherwise good.

I biked in, and met Dei by one of the vehicles. and it turned out we could actually fit everything into one of them. So we left the other one behind. 

In Cemaes we first went to see a stromatolite. And some clastic rocks with a lot of dykes cutting through. I talked about the stromatolite and Dei about the rest. I had requested one of the earlier outcrops so the students would get the message early on that women have things to say. I remember one time not getting an outcrop until the students were knackered. I didn't like that at all. I am still on that gender representation bandwagon! And I think this time it went well.

Dei talking about a dyke

After that first site we walked to the beach, where we looked at the ‘white lady’ sea stack. And from there to the mélange outside the bay. And then we sat down for lunch. It was a beautiful day, but also a quite cold one, so even though it wasn't very windy we wanted to sit in a sheltered spot. And we did.

This is a beach, honest

Amazing old clasts in a conglomeritic phyllite

After lunch I showed them the much better looking stromatolite, and pointed out the thrust fault in the cliff behind Saint Patrick’s cave. And then we went back to the vehicle.

On the other side of the promontory we left all the talking to Jaco. He showed the students conglomerates plastered against a quartzite. This time we clambered over the cliff, and saw some aspects of the contact between the two lithologies we hadn't seen before. Fascinating! But then, when Jaco was explaining fining-upward sequences, it started to rain a bit. And by then I also think everyone was getting tired. So we went back to the vehicle for the final time.

Notice some pebbles plastered against the quartzite 

Dei and me watching Jaco talk from above

Back in Bangor it was fortunately dry. I managed to bike home without getting rained on too much. I was quite thirsty by then; I had biked in in the morning with two hot flasks of water. I didn't want to bring any more on the bicycle, as that would have required both pannier bags. And I also hadn't wanted to fill water containers in Bangor. And I had figured that if I would still be thirsty I could just refill the flasks in a stream. But there weren't many streams, and I never refilled anything, so when I got home I had literally only drank the content of these two flasks, even though I had left home at 8:45 and was back after 18:00. That's not good for me! So in spite of me drinking my body weight in water after coming home, I spent the whole next day still feeling the dehydration. That is why I sometimes choose to drive on a day like that. In a car you can bring all the water you want!

Dehydration aside, it had been a great day. The weather had been kind, and I felt we all had done our bit in telling the students about the geology. And I don't think anyone was stepping into anybody else's territory. So all in all, a great day!