Bench

Bench: a flat section in steep terrain. Characteristically narrow, flat or gently sloping with steep or vertical slopes on either side. A bench can be formed by various geological processes. Natural erosion of a landscape often results in a bench being formed out of a hard strip of rock edged by softer, sedimentary rock. The softer rock erodes over time, leaving a narrow strip of rock resulting in a bench. Coastal benches form out of continuous wave erosion of a coastline.

Whistler & Garibaldi Park

Ablation Zone Accumulation Zone Adit Lakes Aiguille Alpine Zone Arête ARRTI Armchair Glacier The Barrier Battleship Islands Bears Bench Bergschrund Bivouac Cairn/Inukshuk Carter Chimney Cirque Cloudraker Coast Mountains Cordilleran Cornice Corrie Lake Crevasse Dalgleish Deadfall Emerald Forest Erratic The Fissile Fitzsimmons Creek Fitzsimmons Range Fyles Garibaldi Ranges Garibaldi Volcanic Belt Gemel Glacier Window Green Lake Hoary Marmot Krummholz Lithophyte Moraine Mt Garibaldi Mt James Turner Northair Mine Nunatuk Overlord Peak 2 Peak Roundhouse Rubble Creek Scree Spearhead Range Tarn The Table Townsend Usnea Winram

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Cutting away at a coastline can result in vertical cliffs dozens or hundreds of metres high with a distinct bench form. Often a bench takes the form of a long, flat top ridge. Panorama Ridge in Garibaldi Provincial Park is an excellent example of a bench. The Musical Bumps trail on Whistler Mountain is another good example of bench formations. Each "bump" along the Musical Bumps trail is effectively a bench. Russet Lake in Garibaldi Provincial Park has a prominent bench adjacent to it. The bench separates Russet Lake and Adit Lakes. Adit Lakes are two idyllic little tarns in a hidden valley separated from the much busier Russet Lake valley by this bench. Towering above Russet Lake is The Fissile, which is visible from Whistler Village in several places. Easy to spot on a clear day if you look up the valley between Whistler Mountain and Blackcomb Mountain, The Fissile is the symmetrical mountain peak in between. The image below is the bench that separates Russet Lake and Adit Lakes and The Fissile in the next image at the far left.

The Spearhead Range is a subsection of the Garibaldi Ranges that runs in an arc that connects Whistler Mountain and Blackcomb Mountain. The Spearhead ...

Moraines are glacially deposited ridges of debris that accumulate at the sides or terminus of a glacier. Lateral moraines form at the sides of glaciers ...

The Coast Mountains run from the Yukon down to Vancouver along the west coast of British Columbia in a band that averages 300 kilometres wide(190 miles). ...

Columnar Jointing: bizarre looking columns of oddly angular rock formations that can be found in many places around Whistler and worldwide. Generally ...

Ablation Zone: the lower altitude region of a glacier where there is a net loss of ice mass due to melting, sublimation, evaporation, ice calving or ...

Inosculation is the technical name for two or more trees that have fused together into a single bizarre looking tree. They are colloquially known as ...

Col: a ridge between two higher peaks, a mountain pass or saddle. More specifically is the lowest point on a mountain ridge between two peaks. Sometimes ...

Accumulation Zone: the area where snow accumulations exceeds melt, located above the firn line. Snowfall accumulates faster than melting, evaporation and ...