Devil's Lake Field Trip
 |
Located in Baraboo, Wisconsin Devil's Lake State Park is situated
along the Ice Age Trail. Geologic features include:
- Baraboo Quartzite -
formed from ocean sand deposits from a time when Wisconsin lay on the edge
of the continent. Ripple marks in the quartzite record the current directions
from the Precambrian period;
- Elephant Rock - composed of Cambrian beach
and storm deposits from a time when the Baraboo Hills stood as rocky islands
in a turbulent tropical ocean;
- A large talus slope - composed of minivan-sized
boulders tumbled from the quartzite cliffs during the last ice age;
- Devils
Lake – situated within an ancient river gorge that was plugged on both ends
by glacial deposits during the last ice age;
- Pot holes - drilled into solid
quartzite by river-spun boulders.
|
 |
|
 |
| Visit the Van Hise National Historical Landmark. This ~1.7-billion-year-old rock, the most famous outcrop of Precambrian Baraboo quartzite, helped formulate a basic concept of structural geology. |
|
Geologist Norlene Emerson explains these ripples. |
Itinerary
 |
Tuesday July 13th after meeting:
(note: if you are attending the field trip, it is recommended that you extend your stay to include Tuesday overnight with a Wednesday departure)
12:00 p.m. Depart from Gordon Commons with box lunches
1:00 p.m. Explore Upper Narrows of the Baraboo River in
Rock Springs, along the northern limb of the Baraboo syncline.
2:00 p.m. Head to Devil’s Lake.
Devil's Lake State Park is simply spectacular! Some call it the Grand Canyon
of the Midwest. Devils Lake is geologically unique. Situated within the Baraboo
region, the area straddles the boundary between the Driftless Area of southwestern
Wisconsin and the glaciated Eastern Uplands. Three fascinating periods of
Earth's history are preserved here: - Pleistocene Ice age (~18,000-15,000
years ago);
- Cambrian (~500 million years ago); and
- Pre-Cambrian (~1.7 billion
years ago).
|
 |
5:00 p.m. Parfrey’s Glen
Parfrey's Glen – located about 4 miles east of Devil's Lake State Park, reaches
a depth of nearly 100 feet at its uppermost part. The Glen's walls are composed
of alternate layers of sandstone (representing Cambrian beach deposits) and
conglomerate layers containing rounded quartzite boulders representing times
when hurricane driven waves smashed into the quartzite islands and washed pieces
of it onto the sandy ocean bottom offshore.
6:30 p.m. Dinner In Prairie du Sac
8:00 p.m. Leave for Madison
9:00 p.m. Arrive at Witte
|
The above photographs are from previous workshops at CIMSS.
