37-649: The Schurre (pronounced "shoorer") is a stone run in the Bode Gorge in the Lower Harz near Thale in Saxony-Anhalt , Germany. The stone run is slowly slipping downhill, the sliding of its boulders being audible especially during periods of heavy rain. Its name has been given to a much-frequented trail, blazed in 1864 between the Bode Gorge and the legendary Rosstrappe site. In 18 hairpin bends
74-459: A Saxon earl who held lands that were confiscated after 1066 and successfully defied the Normans , for a time at least, rides the hills whenever England is threatened by invasion. The Stiperstones feature in the literary works of Mary Webb , who drew it as The Diafol (translated from Welsh, "Devil's") Mountain in her novel The Golden Arrow (1916), of children's author Malcolm Saville , and in
111-434: A Hill of Ruins, the successive strata of which he has justly compared to the seats of an amphitheatre. (...) In many parts of the island the bottoms of the valleys are covered in an extraordinary manner by myriad great loose angular fragments of the quartz rock, forming "streams of stones." These have been mentioned with surprise by every voyager since the time of Pernety. The blocks are not waterworn, their angles being only
148-587: A jazz work commissioned by Music at Leasowes Bank, written and performed by the Clark Tracey Quintet. D.H. Lawrence used the Stiperstones and the Devil's Chair in particular as a setting for his novel St Mawr (1925). The Half Man Half Biscuit album 90 Bisodol (Crimond) contains a track entitled "Descent of the Stiperstones". An exaggerated version of the Stiperstones is included as
185-422: A little blunted; they vary in size from one or two feet in diameter to ten, or even more than twenty times as much. They are not thrown together into irregular piles, but are spread out into level sheets or great streams. It is not possible to ascertain their thickness, but the water of small streamlets can be heard trickling through the stones many feet below the surface. The actual depth is probably great, because
222-460: A location in the 2020 video game Assassin's Creed Valhalla . Until the early 20th century lead was mined at The Bog, just west of Stiperstones. The mine at The Bog and the adjacent Stiperstones outcrop were only viable because of a geological movement; over time the movement of the tectonic plates landed at this site, combined with the movement of the earth it crumpled the layers and the softest layers were then eroded away. After mining stopped,
259-407: A mile wide, by jumping from one pointed stone to another. So large were the fragments, that being overtaken by a shower of rain, I readily found shelter beneath one of them. Their little inclination is the most remarkable circumstance in these "streams of stones." On the hill-sides I have seen them sloping at an angle of ten degrees with the horizon; but in some of the level, broad-bottomed valleys,
296-678: A partnership of Natural England , Forest Enterprise and the Shropshire Wildlife Trust . Their work has so far seen removal of thousands of pine trees and other conifers, including the whole Gatten Plantation (still shown on OS maps) and the previously covered Nipstone Rock has emerged from hiding. Thousands of heather seedlings have been successfully planted to supplement natural regeneration. To balance this out and complement it further work below summit level has also aimed at restoring grasslands, rich in herbs, hay meadows, wet flushes which produce bog cotton, Heath Bedstraw and
333-463: Is one of the smallest, extending just 15 km (9.3 mi) by 10 km (6.2 mi). However, even on that small territory the stone runs exist along with screes and other rock landforms, suggesting that the right periglacial conditions and rock composition are necessary but not sufficient conditions for the formation of stone runs. Other examples of stone runs occur in England, including at
370-563: Is the patterned ground surrounding the tors; some of the best examples of the periglacial features known as stone stripes and polygons in England. The Stiperstones is a National Nature Reserve and Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI). and is within the Shropshire Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty . It is a haven for wildlife, with birds that are normally associated with upland areas present, including red grouse , Eurasian curlew , peregrine falcon and
407-532: Is up to 300 m wide, and other stone run formations sprawl even wider on the mountain slopes, notably the ‘stone sea’ at the northern foot of Kamen Del Peak. Some boulders are several dozen to over three hundred cubic metres in volume, and sixty to several hundred tons weight. While Vitosha was known already to Thucydides , Aristotle , and Pliny the Elder in Antiquity , its first modern geological survey
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#1732780486980444-699: The Long Mynd to the east, and also gives extensive views towards the North Shropshire plain and the hills of Mid Wales . The tors are formed from heavily faulted Ordovician age, grey-white quartzose sandstones known as the Stiperstones Quartzite Formation. This Arenigian age rock unit which dips steeply to the WNW is between 120 and 325m thick. The western slopes of the hill dropping to Stiperstones village are formed in
481-507: The Quaternary explains both the formation of stone runs in those two territories and their absence in areas with otherwise comparable nature conditions. For instance, while the present Falklands climate is quite similar to that of Scotland , the latter was completely glacial rather than periglacial during the relevant period, which would not allow for the formation of stone runs. On the other hand, due to geological and other specifics of
518-467: The Schurre wends its way up the steep stone run. The trail has been extensively developed and is cobbled in places. Several trees planted along the route, with its extreme climatic conditions, have survived. Negotiating this route uphill from the valley requires walkers to be fit due to its steep gradient and the requirement to climb around 200 metres in height. In May 2010 there was a rockslide that led to
555-642: The Stiperstones , Shropshire. They are also known in Pennsylvania . Small examples are probably very widespread where solifluction deposits contain large concentrations of frost-resistant rock blocks. The Falklands stone runs are made up of hard quartzite blocks. They are more widespread and larger on East Falkland , especially in the Wickham Heights area where the largest of them extend over 5 km in length. Those on West Falkland and
592-426: The last Ice Age . The actual formation of stone runs involved five processes: weathering , solifluction , frost heaving , frost sorting, and washing. The stone runs are essentially different from moraines , rock glaciers , and rock flows or other rock phenomena involving the actual flow of rock blocks under stress that is sufficient to break down the cement or to cause crushing of the angularities and points of
629-693: The Falklands stone runs was given in Antoine-Joseph Pernety ’s account of his exploration of the islands during the 1763–64 French expedition under Louis Antoine de Bougainville , which established the Port Saint Louis settlement on East Falkland . While crossing the neck between Baye Accaron ( Berkeley Sound ) and Baye Marville ( Salvador Water ) he described in detail two particular stone features he called ‘City Gates’ and ‘Amphitheatre’: We were no less astonished at
666-511: The Stipertones Quartzite continues south-southwest to Black Rhadley Hill and peters out just beyond Heath Mynd. To the north-northeast, it continues as far as Pontesbury . Much of the ground around the tors is covered by head , a gravelly and bouldery deposit arising during the present Quaternary period and deriving from the rocks immediately beneath it. There are also some isolated peat deposits in places. Of particular note
703-677: The boulders. By contrast, the stone run boulders are fixed quite stably, providing for safer climbing and crossing of the run. Stone runs are accumulations of boulders with no finer material between them. In the Falklands, they occur on slopes of between 1 and 10 degrees, and are the product of mass-movement and stone sorting during past periods of cold climate. They everywhere occur in association with poorly sorted, clay-rich solifluction deposits. The Falkland Islands and Vitosha Mountain ( Bulgaria ), both have an abundance of large stone runs. The highly specific combination of particular climatic conditions and rock varieties that existed there during
740-448: The crevices between the lower fragments must long ago have been filled up with sand. The width of these sheets of stones varies from a few hundred feet to a mile; but the peaty soil daily encroaches on the borders, and even forms islets wherever a few fragments happen to lie close together. In a valley south of Berkeley Sound, which some of our party called the "great valley of fragments," it was necessary to cross an uninterrupted band half
777-532: The curved strata of the archways lay piled on each other, like the ruins of some vast and ancient cathedral. (...) These scenes are on the spot rendered more striking by the contrast of the low, rounded forms of the neighbouring hills. The Vitosha stone rivers ( Bulgarian : каменна река / kamenna reka, pl. каменни реки / kamenni reki ), located in Bulgaria , are situated in the middle and upper mountain belts at elevation over 1,000 m above sea level. Among
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#1732780486980814-528: The inclination is only just sufficient to be clearly perceived. On so rugged a surface there was no means of measuring the angle; but to give a common illustration, I may say that the slope would not have checked the speed of an English mail-coach. In some places, a continuous stream of these fragments followed up the course of a valley, and even extended to the very crest of the hill. On these crests huge masses, exceeding in dimensions any small building, seemed to stand arrested in their headlong course: there, also,
851-431: The landscape. Facilities at the centre include toilets and car parking (with facilities for the disabled including reserved parking, toilets and ramps). Activities include walking, with two main circular walks called Mucklewick Walk and Flenny Bank Walk and a variety of riding routes. On 25 July 2012 part of the reserve was devastated by fire, said to have been a result of the sudden upturn in dry, hot weather coupled with
888-634: The largest ones are those on the Subalpine plateaus surrounding the summit Cherni Vrah (2290 m), and in the upper courses of the mountain's rivers, extending over 2 km at the Zlatnite Mostove (‘Golden Bridges’) site in the upper course of Vladayska River , and over 1 km in the case of Boyanska , Bistritsa , and Struma Rivers. Golyamata Gramada (Big Pile) Stone River in Vitoshka Bistritsa River valley
925-425: The minor islands are fewer in number and of smaller dimensions. Darwin's "great valley of fragments", subsequently renamed Princes Street Stone Run after Edinburgh 's Princes Street that was cobbled at the time, occupies a 4 km long and 400 m wide shallow valley trending east-west. The feature is situated off the road to Port Louis , some 20 km northwest of Stanley . An early description of
962-616: The overlying Mytton Flag Formation , whereas the eastern slopes are formed in the underlying, and hence older, mudstones of the Shineton Shale Formation. Faulting narrows the outcrop of the Mytton Flags along the southern part of the Stiperstones ridge and the mudstones of the Hope Shale Formation with their interbedded volcaniclastics form much of the afforested ground to the west. The outcrop of
999-468: The path being closed for several months. The path was also closed in summer 2011 due to another major rockslide. 51°44′14″N 11°00′58″E / 51.73722°N 11.01611°E / 51.73722; 11.01611 Stone run A stone run (called also stone river , stone stream or stone sea ) is a rock landform resulting from the erosion of particular rock varieties caused by freezing-thawing cycles in periglacial conditions during
1036-401: The rare ring ouzel . Recently, a project called Back to Purple has commenced, to clear some of the hill of remaining plantations of coniferous and wooded areas, restoring the land to heather -based heath , with seasonal purple-flowering heather covering the summits around the tors and enhancing the views of the Stiperstones from the surrounding peaks and valleys. Back to Purple is managed by
1073-521: The rarer Mountain Pansy and natural woodlands. The general area has a long history of lead mining, most notably during the Roman occupation of Britain . Several pigs of lead have been found nearby, and the tradition continued into Victorian times. The area around the Stiperstones is rich in myths and folklore relating to the rocks of the Devil's Chair. According to one legend, the ghost of Wild Edric ,
1110-399: The sight of the infinite number of stones of all sizes thrown one upon another, and yet ranged as if they had been piled negligently to fill up some hollows. We admired with insatiable delight the prodigious works of Nature. Pernety's observations were continued by the young Charles Darwin , who visited the Falklands in 1833 and 1834: Pernety has devoted several pages to the description of
1147-473: The sky. The Stiperstones is noted for its tors of quartzite . The principal ones are named as follows, from north-east to south-west: Manstone Rock is the highest of these at 536 metres (1,759 ft), and is topped with a trig point . The Devil's Chair is the largest and best known. The Stiperstones ridge is a good place to view the upland landscape of the Shropshire Hills , particularly
Schurre - Misplaced Pages Continue
1184-549: The southern temperate and sub-Antarctic territories with climatic history similar to that of the Falklands ( Prince Edward Islands , Crozet Islands , Kerguelen Islands , Macquarie Island , Campbell Islands , or nearby Tierra del Fuego and Patagonia ), none of them features landforms comparable to the Falklands stone runs. Likewise, the specific geology of Vitosha accounts for the fairly restricted examples of similar landforms in other Bulgarian or indeed Balkan mountains with comparable climatic record among which Vitosha
1221-422: The stone rivers are protected by law. Special permission has been granted in exceptional cases for the removal of some material for sculpture artwork. As a nature park situated right by the outskirts of Sofia ( Cherni Vrah itself being 16 km away from the central square of Sofia), Vitosha is a major tourist destination. Some 1.5 million people from dozens of nations visit the mountain annually, and
1258-545: The stone rivers feature high on the list of tourist attractions. Stiperstones The Stiperstones ( Welsh : Carneddau Teon ) is a distinctive hill in Shropshire , England. The quartzite rock of the ridge formed some 480 million years ago. During the last Ice Age Stiperstones lay on the eastern margin of the Welsh ice sheet . The hill itself was not glaciated though glaciers occupied surrounding valleys and it
1295-446: The undisturbed remnants provided a range of wildlife habitats: birds nest in the old buildings, bats roost in the old mine tunnels, and reservoirs and ponds are ideal for aquatic life. The Bog Visitor Centre is the main facility for visitors to the Stiperstones. It is housed in the former village school and retains its old interior design. It provides historical information about the past workers, mining, and present-day work to restore
1332-480: Was made as late as 1836 by the German - French - Austrian scientist Ami Boué who incidentally had studied medicine at Edinburgh University just a few years before Charles Darwin did. Since Boué, it took several decades of argument to conclude that Vitosha stone rivers were not true glacial moraines as some believed. Exploited in the past as a source of cobblestone material for Sofia ’s streets, nowadays
1369-441: Was subject to intense freezing and thawing which shattered the quartzite into a mass of jumbled scree surrounding several residual rocky tors . At 536 metres (1,759 ft) above sea level it is the second-highest hill in the county, surpassed only by Brown Clee Hill (540 metres (1,772 ft)). Stiperstones' 8-kilometre (5 mi) summit ridge is crowned by several jagged outcrops of rock, which may be seen silhouetted against
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