A PDF of this report is available from the NORA, the NERC archive Barron, H F, Gillespie, M R and Merritt, J W 2011. Geodiversity of the Cairngorms National Park. British Geological Survey Open Report, OR/10/019

Site no.: Q32

Site name: Creag na h- Iolaire Channels

Grid reference: [NH 91077 28497]

Locality: The southern spur of Creag na h-Iolaire and the mountainside lying to the NE towards the Beum a' Chlaidheimh col

GCR Status: N/A

GCR No.: N/A

Type: Natural landform assemblage

Description: Deep, winding and branching channels cut into rock cross the southern spur of Creag na h-Iolaire, one of them 40 m-deep and partially blocked by a substantial rock fall [NH 8999 2725]. The channels lead NE towards an extensive suite of ice marginal channels, benches and associated ridges of blocky boulder moraine that descend obliquely across the south-eastern slopes of Carn Mheadhoin and Carn Allt Laoigh.

Justification: Good example of a suite of features that formed sequentially at the retreating margin of a huge piedmont outlet glacier that occupied Strathspey upstream of Grantown for a while during ice sheet deglaciation.

References