About GlassMountains
The purpose of this site is to share some of my recreational interests, trip reports, and plans with my family and friends, and to provide links to related resources on the web.
My home is the city of Bend located in the Deschutes Basin of Central Oregon, USA. The young High Cascades volcanoes lie to the west. The recent Newberry Volcano on the west end of the active Brothers Fault zone lies to the south. The older rhyolite domes and vents of Powell Butte and Smith Rock State Park lie to the east and north, respectively. Bend is surrounded by lava flows, cinder cones, calderas, and volcanoes, and is built upon basalt flows in a shrub-steppe environment.
Nearby lava flows are rich in obsidian, a dense and typically black volcanic glass used by many native cultures to make arrowheads and blades, and pumice, a light, porous volcanic rock that consists of a network of gas bubbles frozen amidst fragile volcanic glass and minerals.
Because of the volcanic nature of the local geology, and my interest in hiking, mountain biking, skiing, and climbing within this environment, I chose "GlassMountains" for my domain. There is no association with the Glass Mountains of West Texas, Northwestern Oklahoma, or the Eastern Sierra Nevada, California.
Paul on the Web
Paul on FacebookPaul's Picasa Web Albums
Paul on Peakbagger.com
Paul on 14ers.com
References:
Welcome to Bend, OregonCascades Volcano Observatory
USGS Volcano Hazards Program
Deschutes and Ochoco National Forests Geology
The High Desert Museum