A most glorious summer day, a second glorious summer day in the Dales and we did the famous walk to Malham Cove, carved out by water and ice. My pictures make it look empty, but it was full of people. We did, of course, have lovely moments of emptiness, but it was so busy we didn’t walk in the file of people going to the bottom of the cove. We didn’t do more than pause a moment at Janet’s Foss, but it was lovely to see the families enjoying the water.

We also had ice cream. Glorious.

But best of all were the limestone pavements up above Malham Cove, I had never really seen such pavements before. Not like this.

It wasn’t until later that I read more about how these formed–the geology of it is quite amazing.

Karst is defined as a landscape whose features develop are dependent on the presence of efficient underground drainage. Except in deserts, this is only completely achieved where there are caves large enough to carry streams and rivers, and cave passages are only formed naturally in soluble rocks where the groundwater can dissolve away the walls of narrow fissures to turn them into large caves. So karst is a feature of soluble rocks, of which limestone is by far the most important (but is not the only one). Named after the Kras of Slovenia, karst terrains are found all over the world, and the Yorkshire Dales has one of the finest. (102)

Karst is defined as a landscape whose features develop are dependent on the presence of efficient underground drainage. Except in deserts, this valleys is only completely achieved where there are caves large enough to carry streams and rivers, and cave passages are only formed naturally in soluble rocks where the groundwater can dissolve away the walls of narrow fissures to turn them into large caves. So karst is a feature of soluble rocks, of which limestone is by far the most important (but is not the only one). Named after the Kras of Slovenia, karst terrains are found all over the world, and the Yorkshire Dales has one of the finest.

… most Dales karren are much more rounded, in a style that makes them known as rundkarren. The rounding is normally developed when they form underneath a soil cover, where the soil and vegetation keep percolation water against all the limestone surfaces. In few places, notably at the top of Malham Cove it can be seen that soil has recently been stripped off the pavement along the back margin, so that these rundkarren appear to be true sub-soil features. (104)

This is difficult language to piece together, but I love how unfamiliar words like karst and karren fit this landscape. I love how it opens the earth up to understand the coming together of sea and sand, water and stone over the millions of years since the sporadic violence of tectonic movements first cast these ancient seabeds into the sky.

Waltham, Tony (2007) The Yorkshire Dales: Landscape and Geology. Ramsbury: Crowood Press.

Continue reading Malham Cove to Flasby →