Week 3- St.Mary's Glacier- Brett Newman

Colorado is filled with beautiful landscapes, none greater than the beautiful Rocky Mountains. Much of the source of its beauty can be attributed to glaciers, the Rockys being "sculpted by repeated glaciation", as stated in the glacier video. One of these landscapes is St Mary's glacier, located outside of Idaho Springs. While St. Mary's glacier isn't technically defined as a true glacier anymore, just a semi-permanent snowfield, you can still see the impact of a prehistoric glacier carving the mountains.
At the top of the trailed head, there is a breathtaking mountain pond, surrounded by mountains, forming a valley of sorts. This is due to the glacier cutting through the mountains, breaking down the rock, then melting to form a valley. St. Mary's glacier is categorized as an alpine or valley glacier, not a continental one. It is considered a very small glacier compared to others in Colorado, but St. Mary's proves that size doesn't matter, and is just as picturesque as any other in the state. The trail itself is incredibly rocky, possibly the remains of where the mountain range was carved out by the glacier. I was not able to identify the rock types, but according to research, sedimentary rocks, including shale, siltstone, and sandstone are found near rocky mountain glaciers.
I have included a black and white photograph from 1941 and another one from present day, which are interesting to compare, seeing how little the landscape has changed in the past 80 years. While glaciers are constantly changing, this change occurs over thousands of years, these photos being a great reminder of the patient attitude of nature.

I have also included a photo of the trail, which shows just how rocky it is. These rocks a remnants of a mountain range carved by a glacier.