Ladoga skerries #4 - land of boulders

Visiting Ladoga skerries this summer, I already had in mind that I will take some pics for @shasta's boulder challenge. So, I have enough supply for dozen posts.. I will try to pack them all in one... ok, well, maybe two.

Karelia is an ancient mountains, formed by granite rock three and a half billion years ago. Once upon a time there were high Himalayas here, today there are only low hills, pale remains that did not succumb to the breath of time. This is a real kingdom of stones, mosses and lichens.

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Many buildings of St. Petersburg were built / decorated with granite, mined at these shores back in the XIX century. Unbelievable, but it was done with hands! A few stones left by the stonecutters still lie around (one can see a pine trunks beneath them - they served as a rollers, they have been perfectly preserved and do not rot because they have dried well). there is another intresting place of intrest for tourists in Karelia, named _the Ruskeala Mountain Park_ (it is not located at Ladoga skerries, but succifiently closer to the city). Basically, its a Marble quarry, very intresting location to check.

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Pink is the real color of these granites, it is time and the lichens covering them, that make them look so gray. The real colour can be seen on the chips of stone, but granite stone is durable, and chipped spots are quite rare.

We came across many beautiful quartzites. From time to time, our guide stopped at places to note us: look, here you can pick rubies! -- alas, these rubies are not at all the same as the Indian ones, they are small, inconspicuous seeds of no interest, really nothing intresting for a photographer.

One of the islands revealed us a rock vein called "vaalamite": it is less ancient than granite (2.5 billion years old only) and less durable; at this certain spot, where I took the pic, this vein lies between two granite layers, and theres a large canyon here: _the vaalamite_ had eroded, and _the granite_ did not lose its position a step. It loked like a real gold dust for me! A good chance to mention @rt395, who is running #mineralmondays, hope you will find this intresting.

Here is a reeded sandy beach.

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Sandy beaches are quite rare at the Northern Ladoga (altho the southern shore of the lake is all plain and sandy, no rocks and no skerries here). So, 99% of the beaches are pebbles and cobblestones of varying degrees. Very often, the shore is one huge stone monolith.

The in-between space is heavily used and inhabited, gues who are the landlords...

The poor but wonderful flora of Ladoga skerries (including berries, @ackhoo!) is the topic of our next lecture.

I've captured some very cool shadows there, this was the very 1st one, of course I couldnt but remember about you, @melinda010100. I hope you like it as much as I did.. and let me hoard the rest, till the weekly topic become 'people' or 'boats'

:P

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the images taken with Canon 5d + 16-35mm 2.8L, all rights reserved

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This is my entry both for the #BoulderSunday and #MountainMonday challenge hosted by @shasta

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Now I am calling a few friends, who I promised a photo-review of my trip; at least check the pictures... maybe you become passionate enough to join me in the next years? who knows... @bambuka, @tatdt, @lightcaptured, @ackhoo, @ewkaw