Caves, water and me are not a good combination so never expect me to become a cave diver or even stand inside one like this to take a photograph but landscape photographer and environmentalist, Linde Waidehofer, from Colorado has been coming here since 2003.
They call it the Marble Cathedral, a network of water-filled marble caverns in South America's second largest freshwater lake, Lago Carrera. Ice fields once blocked the western end of the lake but now the the glacier-fed waters drain into the Pacific Ocean where Chile and Patagonia end.
Geologists believe the colour and clarity of the lake is due to finely ground glacial silt. The water level is constantly changing and the photography is never the same because of the filtering light.The water can vary from turquoise to deep blue depending on the weather and the time of the year.
But just because it's so beautiful doesn't mean it's safe. Patagonia's Baker River which flows from this lake is part of a dam system that Chile wants to develop even though this area has been named an official nature sanctuary.
But just because it's so beautiful doesn't mean it's safe. Patagonia's Baker River which flows from this lake is part of a dam system that Chile wants to develop even though this area has been named an official nature sanctuary.If you want to read more about these beautiful caverns then information about Linde's book "Blue Light" can be found at http://www.westoneye.com/books
6 comments:
It's like those oil and water paintings we did in school where you put the coloured oil paint on top of a tub of water and lay the paper on top to get the magic striations of colour, depth and marbling.
Mother Nature at her very artistic best :)
WV= eflic...'e flics 'is feminist bloomers to the left and 'e flics 'is birdie to the beloved neighbours to the right.
That is unbelievably beautiful. The colours and shapes are amazing. I'm with you, I couldn't go into them but I am so glad that a skilled photographer did. And that you shared them. Thanks.
how absolutely lovely, but ... Patagonia?
thank god the interwebz saved me the journey
X X X
Those caves are truly beautiful. I would love to wander around in there with my camera. It's probably very cold though, being glacier fed. How can Chile even think of spoiling it with a dam system?
Jayne, you remember school? Actually it's the same with putting colour on pure silk.
EC, I'd buy her book but I'm barred from book buying for another 2 months or until I read the backlog littering the house.
Annie O, my neighbour goes trekking every year and went to Patagonia last winter. I can do that with the interwebz in comfort.
River, a government will dam anything for money. It's freezing down the bottom end of Chile and Patagonia, just google Straits of Magellen or Drake Passage which was the only way from the Atlantic to the Pacific before the Panama Canal.
Isn't the earth an amazing place...so much still unseen
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