Hi all, HW is french and we have been in France on vacation to see her family, and now in the French alps on vacation, but the geology is "in your face". While visiting the cousin of HW ("heartland wife") we went for a walk with his kids and we nearly walked on a viper...which is poisonous, and without the warning. When it slid beneath the grass it became invisible.

We took train from Grenoble to Briancon across the alps. The external alps have big cliffs of Mesozoic limestone that were once reefs etc. They are thrust over each other. The 19th and early 20th century geologist must have had an interesting time figuring out how to match things up across the big thrusts. Some thrust blocks in the Alps have slid 100+km across the top etc (from what I learned in 1984 as student at French university: we had 3 week trip camping across alps with last half spent in one place mapping).

Today we go east of Briancon near Italian border where ophiolites are between 2000 and 3800 m elevation. Ophiolites are ocean crust. There are pillow basalts (erupted under water). HW works on deep ocean crust in east Pacific mainly (among other things) so she will have to hike on up with HD and me (she has a foot injury of sorts, though).

M4.9 quake today or yesterday near main active strand of North Anatolian fault in Marmara Sea, SW of Istanbul. My manuscript is under review.
Chris