What Lies Hidden in the Forest near Kazar?The Mind-Blowing
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The so-called beehive stones were often carved in rhyolite tuff, an easy-to-form volcanic rock. When I heard that there is a large rhyolite tuff formation in a nearby forest, immediately we set out to explore it... |
"Oh, wow... oh, my god..." I literally cried out loud, after crawling through an annoying, thorny ticket in the woods, I saw it! Some 20 million years ago, a volcano erupted here, ejected volcanic ash that lithified into the rhyolite tuff formations that can still be seen today. Suddenly, nothing grows and the landscape is so dramatically different that we feel in another time, another reality...
Someone, once said that the difference between a bolt of lightning and the Sphinx of Egypt is in the speed of the process. Lightning happens fast, as it comes and goes; while the sphinx, goes deceptively slow, fooling us that it's a permanent feature of the world, while it is also transient like everything else. This is the key to the fascination this landscape holds: Here, we are in the middle of the process of a volcanic eruption: a process that began with a dramatic start millions of years ago but is still not finished today. The creamy white rocks are soft and porous: they crumble upon the lightest touch. The erosion is ongoing: it is happening through the rainwater that carves deep striations into the surface, so that the rocks look like the folded skin of a Shar-Pei puppy... and it is continuing through the wind that blows and through the humans who visit.
These whole formations shouldn't even be here. In wooded areas, such as this, tuff typically remains under the ground. Only in dry, deserted areas such as the famous Cappadocia region in Turkey, or the Badlands National Park in South Dakota, USA are they out in the open. Some say, it was deforestation and grazing that brought it all out on the surface here, in Hungary, in an otherwise typical continental forest. It's a unique geological treasure... Even though there were signs to the unique geological treasure, the road was so muddy, we went into the forest and got hooked on thorns, eventually, however, the amazing vista opened.
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The fascination this landscape had on me was remarkable - even though there was not a single carving in the rocks. Yet, there I felt like being part of a larger story - a story of 20 million years. This is the magic inherent in the landscape. The connection we can make with the land takes us away in space and time, silently but powerfully reminding us that there is something beyond our little every-day human affair - something that is increasingly calling for our attention...
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Eternal. Moving. Alive.