taken 2 years ago, near to Baile na Creige, Barra, Na h-Eileanan an Iar, Scotland
Gneiss outcrop
A beautifully smoothed outcrop of the Lewisian Gneiss which displays characteristic, folded bands of varying colours. The entire island of Barra comprises outcrop of the Lewisian Gneiss, the oldest rock in the UK, and well up in the league table of oldest rocks exposed on Earth. Originating as granitic intrusions into basaltic crust during the first stirrings of plate tectonics and subjected to multiple phases of metamorphism during collisions between the youthful continental plates, once plastic features are now a frozen record of early Earth history. Fabulous!
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