The immortal bridge
No one really knows how these enormous rocks fell in this unusual place. Together they form a natural bridge spanning over a seemingly bottomless ravine. This so called “immortal bridge” can be found on Mount Tai in the Chinese province of Shangdong.
It is a mountain of cultural and religious significance and counts as one of the five sacred mountains of China. Mount Tai is seen as a symbol of the country’s peace and prosperity and has been visited by many Emperors who performed different ceremonies on the mountain. It is listed both as a World Natural Heritage and World Cultural Heritage by UNESCO.
Its geological history started in the Cambrian period about 500 million years ago. Mount Tai is a typical tilted fault-block mountain. A fault block is a body of rock partly or completely defined by faults and differing in elevation from its surroundings. The mountain comprises sedimentary, magmatic and metamorphic rocks. These rocks create many beautiful formations, such as the immortal bridge which is likely to have been like this since the last ice age.
Xandi Image Credit: http://bit.ly/1N5Jy6e Sources: http://www.chinahighlights.com/mount-tai/ http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/437 http://bit.ly/1J1qQ4A