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- [REQUIRED] Please post a photo in your log of yourself or a personal item with the park in the background to prove you visited the site.
- Is the Cape Smokey Granite outcrop basically uniform, or do you see any lines of dark minerals running through it, or any dark crystals placed throughout?
- Would embedded minerals make it more durable, or less?
- Look at the mineral grains. Are they randomly oriented or all aligned? What does this mean for the strength of the rock?
Laurentia, Avalonia and Ganderia were three landmasses joined during formation of the Appalachian mountains, and were the founding elements of northern Nova Scotia’s geological past.
The microcontinent Avalonia broke off with a series of terranes and a separate block called Ganderia. Ganderia can be found in Newfoundland, New Brunswick, New England, and Nova Scotia. In Nova Scotia, rocks of Ganderia are restricted to the rocks of the Bras d'Or terrane on Cape Breton Island.
The granite on the Cape Breton Highlands formed at the end of the Cambrian period, a time of rapid change as continents rearranged themselves. There are few igneous rocks of similar age in Ganderia.
Typical granite is a light-colored igneous rock with grains large enough to be visible with the unaided eye. It forms from the slow crystallization of magma below Earth's surface. Granite is composed mainly of quartz and feldspar with minor amounts of mica, amphiboles, and other minerals. Dark minerals such as biotite weather easily and can make the rock less durable. Some granite has minerals that are aligned, which means there is layering that could weaken the granite. If the granite has randomly oriented minerals, it is a stronger, more durable granite.
At the posted coordinates, you will find a boulder or outcrop of what is called Cape Smokey Granite.