The Appalachian Mountains and the Scottish Highlands are the same mountain range, because it is older than the continents moving apart.
The Atlantic Ocean is younger than the Appalachian Mountains.
And apparently the Scandinavian Mountains are also a part of the same mountain range. Cool!
TIL
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My favorite geological fact about Scotland is the super obvious fault line that slashes straight through it. The Great Glen.
This sound like the opening of some eldritch horror novel.
There's unironically a bunch of Appalachian cosmic horror stuff out there. In fact iirc Savage Worlds has a setting for it called Holler and Monte Cook games published a ttrpg for the Old Gods of Appalachia podcast.
If I hadn't burned myself out on Pseudopod, Welcome to Nightvale, The Black Tapes, and Limetown, I'd be a bigger fan.
But my friends swear up and down by Old Gods. Solid writing and a good creepy blend of the mundane and surreal.
Well if you know anything about Appalachian lore
The resting place of cthulhu's rotten carcass
In the same vein, sharks are older than trees.
Sharks are older than Saturn's rings.
Because North America and Africa were once geographically connected, the Appalachians formed part of the same mountain chain as the Little Atlas in Morocco. This mountain range, known as the Central Pangean Mountains, extended into Scotland, before the Mesozoic Era opening of the Iapetus Ocean, from the North America/Europe collision (See Caledonian orogeny)
By the end of the Mesozoic Era, the Appalachian Mountains had been eroded to an almost flat plain.[27] It was not until the region was uplifted during the Cenozoic Era that the distinctive topography of the present formed.
The Appalachian mountains are full of hillbillies. THAT'S the scary part.
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Wouldn't they be mountainbillies?
Banjo intensifies.
The hills have bones
They'll kick your ass too. Source: hiked hundreds of miles therein
This is one of those "Sharks are older than the North Star" things that's going to live in my head rent free forever.
Most of the Appalachians is now located within the eastern part of the United States as runoff. Imagine how long it took for huge mountains to erode down and wash outwards into the ocean that distance.
And the Appalachians are still young compared to a few other mountain areas around the world.
Australia and South Africa giving me the willies.
Yup. Makhanjwa range in the north west of SA is three times as old as the Appalachians at 3.5 billion years. Days were only twelve hours long back then….
How old is the Australian Great Dividing Range (which has been worn down quite low)
Ed. It's not on the top ten. The Australian old ranges include the Pilbara
To expand on this, being older than bones is why you can't find animal fossils in the Appalachian mountains.
Is that just for vertebrates? Seems that exoskeletons should still be fair game, right?
You are correct. I had a brain fart. There are shells and the like, but you won't come across the next big T-Rex find.
Keith Richards built the Appalachian mountains.
Seems like North America has always had a thing for conservatism.
How does one pronounce Appalachian?
TAKE ME HOME, COUNTRY ROAD
Isn't that basically the plot of a season in the adventure zone?
There's a Cypher System RPG called Old Gods of Appalachia that's pretty neat too.
As I mentioned in another comment, but elaborating further here, there's a Savage World's setting that revolves around eldritch horror and rampant corporate industry called Holler.
Am I the only one who the image is not loading for?
Edit: It's working now.
the appalachian mountains are older than saturn's rings. the appalachian mountains are older than dinosaurs. the appalachian mountains are older than trees. the appalachian mountains are literally older than BONES. the appalachian mountains should be regarded with pure terror.
I thought the Rockies were older
The Rockies are actually relatively recent, 55M to 80M years old. The Appalachians are much older and part of the reason they aren't anywhere near as big as (for example) the Rockies, is because they have been eroded for so much longer. That said, they are still definitely not the oldest mountain range. It looks like the Makhonjwa Mountains win that one.
Nah the rockies were made by continental drift. Kind of. It's complicated.
