Death Valley 22: Folds in Rocks at the Racetrack

Image Commentary

When rocks are folded, the disposition of the folded beds is defined by two complimentary terms: "dip" and "strike". In this image the strike of the rocks is roughly obliquely sub-parallel to the axis of the camera lens, the dip is a vector at right angles to the strike, in this case dipping to the right. In the forground is an absolutely flat dry lake bed called a "playa". The obvious texture is due to repeated evaporation of shallow standing water and the dessication of the playa-bed muds. Most commonly the mud dries and cracks into a very hard pan, scarred by a near perfectly polygonal mosaic of dessication cracks (see image RF16).