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Now heading east toward Split Rock where we started. If you'd like to see more from this part of the hike [ youtube video ]
The 1200 square miles of the park are sprinkled by piles of massive boulders of granite – rock formations known as tors – towering the surrounding sparsely vegetated hilly landscape . These formations vary in size from isolated groups of boulders to entire mountains.
The rock piles in Joshua Tree began underground; magma cooling into granite rose toward the earth's surface and into the cracks of the existing rock (the Pinto Gneiss formation). Groundwater filtered downward into the cracks, and centuries of erosion sculpted the rocks into their rounder shapes. Erosion on the surface from flash floods, wind, and rain wore the earth down around these already fully-formed piles.
The 1200 square miles of the park are sprinkled by piles of massive boulders of granite – rock formations known as tors – towering the surrounding sparsely vegetated hilly landscape . These formations vary in size from isolated groups of boulders to entire mountains.
The rock piles in Joshua Tree began underground; magma cooling into granite rose toward the earth's surface and into the cracks of the existing rock (the Pinto Gneiss formation). Groundwater filtered downward into the cracks, and centuries of erosion sculpted the rocks into their rounder shapes. Erosion on the surface from flash floods, wind, and rain wore the earth down around these already fully-formed piles.