Garden Creek Gap EarthCache
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Difficulty:
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Terrain:
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Size: 
(not chosen)
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Please note: Parking is very limited, but this cache can be done by
touring in your vehicle. If you choose to stop be carefull of
traffic, keep your childred with you at all times just to be
safe.
Garden Creek Gap is like finding a an oasis in the desert, a
treasure in the sage brush an, a world of wonder as brief as it is
beautiful.
Enjoy it in all of it’s splendor, use extreme caution, keep
children by your side at all times. If you explore the area please
note areas posted private.
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How the Gap was formed and how the Basin was
integrated.
Some bedrock slivers, uplifted along synthetic faults with offset
less than those of the major range-bounding faults had been deeply
buried by the rising level of the Miocene Salt Lake Group basin
fill. Higher, more uplifted bedrock that wasn't buried deeply by
basin fill, was encountered early in the regional downcutting by
the northwestward-flowing drainage network.
As the continental divide migrated to the east, westward drainage
became superposed on the basin fill and on bedrock divides between
basins, connecting those basins and allowing more upstream, eastern
ones to become regraded to lower, more westerly ones.
Major drainages through the Portneuf and Bannock ranges were
established in this way.
The cutting of the northwestward flowing main drainage of the
system, through Portneuf Narrows between Inkom and Pocatello, has
become a dominant westward egress to the Pacific.
A particularly elegant example of superposition and incipient basin
capture, is the relationship between Hawkins Basin and Creek and
the Garden Creek drainage.
In the eastward flow of Garden Creek, draining the basin west of
Scout and Old Tom Mountain, the superposed creek had encountered
quartzite of the Scout Mountain Member of the Pocatello Formation,
and became trapped, forming the narrow Garden Creek Gap.
As the newly north-draining Marsh Creek continued to cut downward,
both Garden Creek and Hawkins Creek followed along; the former in a
steep canyon.
The northern headwaters of Hawkins Creek today are eating headward
into a narrow ridge of volcanigenic basin fill, all that remains
separating Hawkins Basin from the Garden Creek drainage.
Because of the temporary base level provided by the quartzites at
Garden Creek Gap, the divide between the headwaters of Hawkins
Creek and Garden Creek will continue to migrate northward.
Eventually no water will flow through Garden Creek Gap. It will
become a wind gap, common in the Valley and Ridge of the
Appalachians.
Logging requirements:
1. How long is the Gap?
2.At the western end of the Gap on the right side is a small
quarry. What type of rock located here and what are the
coordinates?
3.What great geological event took place that formed this
area?
4. What is the name of the road that goes through the Gap?
5. The Gap is west of what two mountains?
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Excerpts from Essay on Topographic and Geomorphic Development of
Southeastern Idaho 1995
by H. Thomas Ore, Department of Geology, Idaho State
University
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
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Treasures
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