Shore to Summit: A Photographic Guide to the Geology of Britain and Ireland - Hardcover

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Fran Halsall is one of the country's up-and-coming young photographers, taking as her inspiration the wild landscapes, diverse geology and different habitats of the British Isles. Her work is widely published, appearing in advertising, calenders, magazines and books. Since 2004 she has taught photography courses on location in the Peak District National Park. Fran also won two prizes in the Outdoor Writers and Photographers Guild Awards 2009 for The Peak District and North Yorkshire Limestone Pavements. To visit the awards website click here To visit Fran's website click here

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09 Paps of Jura and Loch an t-Siob, Inner Hebrides, Argyll and Bute (Not yet photographed)

The Paps of Jura are among that special order of hill to have captured the imagination of both ancient and modern people with their breast-shaped peaks. The term pap could come from the Old Norse for breast or nipple, or from the Latin ‘papilla’, meaning the same, and although these hills are sometimes singular they often come in pairs or even in threes, as seen here on Jura.  Starting with the tallest Beinn an Òir (mountain of gold), Beinn Shiantaidh (holy mountain) and Beinn a' Chaolais (mountain of the kyle) 734 m across the waters of the beautifully named Loch an t-Siob, which translates as the Loch of the Spindrift on account of the wind-driven swirling watery spray.

Alike with the Maiden Paps in the Scottish Borders and the Paps of Anu in County Kerry these curvaceous landforms are allied with the feminine.  In the latter case the hills are directly associated with the Celtic goddess Annan or Anu, however on Jura, as indeed in many instances, if there was a link with a specific deity then this memory has been lost.     

The mountains are mostly quartzite dating from 610 Ma, which forms much of the upland scenery throughout Argyll.  During the last Ice Age the mountain-tops remained above the ice sheet and became nunatuks, or isolated rock islands on a sea of ice.  These exposed rocks weather differently from the rocks trapped underneath the ice, which are worn smooth, and instead they are attacked by frost shattering.  When water seeps along a joint in the rock and then freezes, it expands putting pressure on the surrounding rock.  As the ice thaws and the joints widen, more water can invade the gap and the process is repeated the next time the temperature drops.  This is known as a freeze-thaw cycle and it is capable of splitting even the hardest rocks into angular blocks that now litter the mountains’ sides.

10 Llanddwyn Island / Ynys Llanddwyn, Anglesey – Ynys Mon

 Like a series of unfurling fractals kilometre long Llanddwyn is a small island off a medium-sized one (Anglesey) next to an even larger one (Britain).  Although strictly speaking only completely inaccessible by foot at the highest of tides, Llanddwyn feels but tenuously connected with Anglesey by a stretch of sand that has only been in place since the last Ice Age.  Where better for the self-imposed isolation of Saint Dwynwen, the Welsh prince of Brycheiniog’s (Brecon’s) daughter, who retreated here after turning down a marriage proposal, preferring to become a religious hermit instead.  Today a 16th century chapel stands over the site of the original chapel she established and there is also a well dedicated to her.

 Llanddwyn protrudes finger-like into Caernarfon Bay and boasts an extraordinary array of late Precambrian rocks, including salmon pink chert among dark grey pillow-basalt and limestone.  Chert is composed of silica coloured pink by iron.  The surrounding basalt is an iron and magnesium-rich lava and is one of the main constituents of oceanic crust.  Molten basalt’s disorganised crystal structure makes it behave like a liquid and it readily pours forth from ocean trenches and rifts on land.  Although its low viscosity makes it more likely to erupt when it does it flows steadily rather than exploding dramatically.  Llanddwyn is noted for its pillow lavas created when a submarine basalt flow is arrested in its tracks by cooling seawater.  A skin quickly develops and is then inflated with more lava, which forms characteristic bubbles that remain as it cools. 

 England and Wales came into existence as a chain of volcanic islands,