Another from the South Island trip. This is at St Bathans and is a hill made from white quartz tailings, from the former gold mining days. In 1887, St Bathans was home to around 2,000 gold miners. A 120m high hill was mined and eventually became a 168m deep pit. The water and gravel was hydraulically lifted from the deep pit and worked for gold. In 1934, mining ceased as it was deigned too close to the town to continue, so the pit was left to fill. The lake formed from this mining is a beautiful blue and the colour is from the minerals in the area. On the day this image was taken, the lake wasn't showing any blue, as the weather was overcast.
I love how Mother Nature - left to her own devices - knocks the rough edges off the worst of man's excesses and leaves us something beautiful to remember instead, like this quartz mound.
