Geological History of the Cascades | Pacific Northwest | Lindblad Expeditions-National Geographic

I grew up in the Midwest 2,500 feet up rolling gentle plains lots of lakes and then I moved to the west coast oceanfront property oh it's a it's really nice but then you came out here and it's magnificent just so unique how the rocks are cut away

going back 16 to 14 million years ago we had these massive initially flooding episodes of basalt that were rising from fissures in the Earth's crust

it slammed across eastern Washington creating what we call the coolies by scouring away top soils all the way down to and into the bedrock of basalt underneath

they came here to this spot and what do they meet they meet the Cascade Mountains a point where the water got all backed up as it had to make its way through the Columbia River Gorge