During the last 7 days Geo Logica took the Pittsburg-Johnstown University Geology Club on a field trip in Portugal that started in the north of the country and went all the way to the its southernmost tip.
This field trip was entitled “from Pangea to the Atlantic Opening”.
The group crossed the Douro valley and understood its geological evolution, from an endorheic to an exorheic basin, and its influence on the local terroir. Then looked at the Variscan Orogeny and the formation of Pangea at Foz do Douro metamorphic complex together with local expert Monica Sousa.
Afterwards, drove along Portugal’s central Atlantic coast, passing by Nazaré, Alcobaça, Óbidos and Peniche where the club observed salt diapirs, exhumed oil field, the formation process of giant waves and the Toarcian GSSP at Ponta do Trovão (Peniche).
Continuing southwards along the country, the participants went inside a squeezed salt diapir at Loulé, discovering how this structure was formed and why our lives wouldn’t be possible without the salt of the Earth!
Almost at the end of the field trip the group observed one of the most amazing outcrops in the world, the Ponta do Telheiro Angular Unconformity at Vila do Bispo. If James Hutton was Portuguese, this place would be his Siccar Point! In a nutshell, at this extraordinary Geosite the Pennsylvanian (Carboniferous) Brejeira Formation turbidites, tightly folded by the Variscan Orogeny, are truncated and overlain by Upper Triassic Silves Formation red beds, materializing a sedimentary hiatus of more than 70 million years. A superb chevron anticline affecting Carboniferous turbidites resembles a shed roof gives the name of this site, known as Praia do Telheiro.
The last outcrops visited where observed during a superb boat trip along the Central Algarve coast, where the students had the opportunity to study coastal erosional processes and even observe dolphins in their natural habitat.
Before flying back home,, the group had a final cultural stop at Lisbon, the country Capital.
For more info about Geo Logica Field Trips for Universities please contact us via letsdiscover@geologica.xyz
