Hongshixia Science Tour Route

The geological attractions, natural attractions and human attractions distributed on this route mainly include a line of sky, scenic monument, angular unconformity surface, Black Dragon Temple fault, White Dragon Pool, beach sedimentary layer sequence, wave marks, mud cracks, wind-formed interlocking laminae, tidal composite laminae, Shurong Waterfall, etc.

1、Angle not integrated

Angular unconformity is a kind of stratigraphic contact relationship, which means that there is a big difference in production between the upper and lower strata, and there is a long interruption in deposition, which is a true reflection of the changes in the sea. The angular unconformity here, the lower stratum is Tauric schist and gneiss formed before 2.5 billion years ago, and the upper stratum is a purplish red quartzite-like sandstone in the middle of 1-1.4 billion years ago, and the unconformity surface in the middle represents a sedimentary interruption of more than 1 billion years.

2、Ancient beaches

This brightly colored, beautifully textured red rock beneath our feet is geologically known as quartz sandstone. It was formed in the coastal beach environment around 1.2 billion years ago. Along with the rising and falling of sea level, high and low tide at that time, this area sometimes sank to the bottom of the sea and sometimes exposed to the surface, thus forming the coastal form, wind-formed dune form and intertidal form of sedimentary construction, leaving rich sedimentary structure remains such as interlaced laminae and wave marks and mud cracks in the rocks. The total thickness of this set of red quartz sandstone, which reaches 150 meters in the Yuntai Mountain area, constitutes the main body of the rocks of Red Rock Canyon. The red color of the sandstone is formed by the oxidation of the iron content in the rocks. The uneven iron content leads to different shades of sandstone color, which constitutes a variety of patterns with beautiful shapes.

3、Red Rock Canyon

The Red Stone Gorge is a typical linear gorge formed by surface water tracing down two groups of joints in the purple-red quartzite-like sandstone, forming a barrier valley at the intersection of the two groups of joints and a narrow valley at the development of one group of joints. In the compact space of 1.5 Km long and only a few meters to ten meters wide, the majestic mountain and the mysterious water are fully embodied. The red rocks and blue water in the gorge are like spring in all seasons, and the moss under the waterfall is like a green golden silk dragon hanging felt; the cliff walls are concave and convex due to the washing of water, and the texture is clear and wonderfully combined, like a high relief model, which is pleasing to the eyes.

4、Zifang Lake

Zifang Lake is an artificial lake along the deep canyon of Quaternary period by blocking and becoming the sky, the reservoir capacity of 12 million m3, hanging high in the end of the red stone gorge, the two shores of the karst peaks and the lake's complement each other, dynamic and static change, the scene of a thousand. Along the east shore of Zifang Lake winding northbound, a colorful picture scroll, slowly to show us, the green mountains, pale sky, the water, quiet Bay ......, endless, magnificent and strange, living like a mythical world.

5、Hongshi River

The upstream of Zi Fang Lake is a section of purple-red quartz sandstone cut by flowing water to form a river valley, which we named the Red Stone River according to the mood. A series of waterfalls and stream pools are formed in the river valley with the fall of the terrain, and the mood of the Danqing landscape is well reflected here.

6、Parallel non-integration

Below the interface is the quartz sandstone formed 1.2 billion years ago, and above the interface is the shale and carbonate formed around 500 million years ago, because the crustal movement at that time is mainly expressed as the overall lift, so the two sets of stratigraphy above and below the interface are basically the same, we call this interface parallel unconformity.

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