I’m visiting New York this week, and I took some time to walk around Central Park. I stopped for a delicious coffee and then continued exploring the park on foot — 4 hours and almost 25k steps to go from south to north and back.
What surprised me the most were the giant rocks you can see all around the park. I couldn’t imagine how the rest of the city was built on top of these massive formations.
After looking into it a bit more, I learned that these rocks are part of the Manhattan schist, an extremely hard bedrock that lies beneath much of the city. This geological foundation is actually one of the reasons why New York was able to build so many skyscrapers — the buildings could anchor directly into the solid rock below.
Pretty amazing to think that beneath all the concrete, traffic, and skyscrapers, there’s this ancient natural foundation that has been there for millions of years.