Deciding where to go today was a difficult decision. We had arranged with Anna Mpatsi to do my last days fieldwork together, but we had no idea where. Luckily, Annie came to the rescue, and suggested a section through the Aspropotamos Complex, which we had just touched up'on on the day where we met our amphiboles in peridotite on Dramala with Nikos. We worked our way up, from Grevena to the Ambelia Section, starting in the pillow lavas. The first proper stop was spilitic pillows; something which I have a hard time getting excited about. The sulphide pipe was much more exciting, packe as it was with arseno and iron pyrites, along with a small amount of native sulphur. The pipe is apparently one of the largest in the world, but too low in the section to be of economic interest. Unfortunately, if the pipe did once reach the surface, it has since been eroded, leaving us with only a hint of what might once have been.
Continuing our journey through the section, we reached the Ambelia Bridge, which marks the boundary between the Aspropotamos Crustal sequence and mantle peridotites of Dramala. Above us lies the Liagkouna sole, which showed in the amount of amphibolite on the road. Along the valley, outcrops of melange include three types of lava, one of which is from the Aspropotamos, along with several other blocks. This is potentially an important area for figuring out the relationships between the to thrust sheets (and I presume was used by Jones and Robertson in their work in the late 80s-early 90s), but there was no time to study it in any detail today.
Instead, we continued up the track out of the valley, passing gabbro, wehrlite, dunite and plagiogranite cumulate layering. Some of the gabbros have oikocrysts clearly visible with the naked eye - we collected as much as we could for posterity.
By the time we had finished along the roadcuts, both Anna and Annie (and to be honest me as well) were exhausted, so we decided to head back for a long rest. In the evening, Anna returned to Grevena, and to celebrate (?!) my leaving, we had a fantastic meal at the fish restaurant. Between the 6 of us (Mike and Babi came along too) we ate four tentacles of octopus, four plates of squid, two of saganaki (cooked cheese), one hot pepper (we really didn't need any more of that!), two xoriatiki salads, one plates of patates and three baskets of bread. Lightning flashed around us as we sat under the tentes (awning), thunder rumbled, and the rain splashed the parched ground, sending most Grevenotika running for home. We stayed, and enjoyed the freshening air and wonderful food. Annie treated us all to the full spread (E100 of it) and we all went home pleasantly full.
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