Brooks Point

Brooks and Gowlland Points (on South Pender Island) are adjacent and some of the descriptions make it a bit hard to distinguish the two - not that it really matters. I believe the more northeasterly point, and the more distinctive one, is Gowlland, which I'll save for the next post. The top photo is of Gowlland, taken from Brooks (or so I think). The second is of Brooks, taken from Gowlland.

Both points, and everything else around here, are carved out of strongly folded Nanaimo Group conglomerates (Cretaceous) - which I think I first learned about during an orientation field trip at UW more than 30 years ago!  Nanaimo sedimentary rocks - which are not all conglomerates - form most of the southern Gulf Islands.  The aerial view shows the extent to which sedimentary structure controls the shape of the islands.

AERIAL VIEW

I wish I had photos of the gigantic boulders in the forest on the way here along Gowlland Point Road. From some drive-by geology - and some inferences from Google Earth - they look like rockfalls along the steep ridge between the road and Greenburn Lake. I suspect they are old - maybe they are blocks of the conglomerate that fell off the cliff or out of the edge of the glacier when the ice retreated?