A reef in Salt River Bay. Image from the National Park Service's page.
Salt River Bay National Historical Park and Ecological Preserve lies around Salt River Bay on the north-central coast of St. Croix in the U.S. Virgin Islands. Authorised on February 24, 1992, it covers approximately 400 hectares (989 acres) and protects a ridge-to-reef landscape: coral reefs, a submarine canyon, mangrove forests, tropical shoreline and the uplands around the bay.
More than 2,000 years of people
The park's human history goes back more than 2,000 years. It includes an aboriginal village site; a Taíno ball court, a ceremonial plaza lined with stones; and the structures of later European plantations — together a chance to explore how people lived in the Caribbean before and after European explorers arrived in 1493. It holds the only confirmed site where members of Christopher Columbus's second expedition, in 1493, set foot on what is now U.S. territory. At the mouth of the bay stands Fort Salé, a 17th-century fortification and one of the earliest of the few European forts in the New World that survive.
The rocks
St. Croix's geology spans the Cretaceous to the present, and it makes a lively landscape of mountains, dissected ridges, valleys, coastal lowlands and bluffs. Three groups of rock appear in the park:
| Unit | Age | What it is |
|---|---|---|
| Judith Fancy Formation (Mount Eagle Group) | Cretaceous | tuffaceous rock, the park's oldest bedrock; it covers much of western and central St. Croix |
| Jealousy Formation | Oligocene | limy conglomerate and dark, clay-rich layers lying on top of the Judith Fancy |
| Alluvium and beach deposits | Holocene | the youngest deposits, laid down by the Salt River and along the bay's coastal lowlands |
The Judith Fancy Formation takes its name from Estate Judith Fancy on the park's eastern boundary, where it is well exposed in coastal bluffs. The Jealousy Formation was probably named after Estate Jealousy, about 5 km (3 mi) southwest of the park. Between them, these two formations make the high ridges, hills and steep slopes that surround Salt River Bay.
A boat on Salt River Bay. Image from the National Park Service's page.
Maps and reports
The National Park Service's Geologic Resources Inventory produces digital geologic maps and reports for more than 270 natural resource parks. Its products for Salt River Bay — scoping summaries of what the park's mapping should cover, digital geologic maps for GIS software, reports on the park's geologic features, processes, management issues and history, and posters — are on the NPS DataStore. The Geodiversity Atlas has a companion entry for nearby Buck Island Reef National Monument.
Sources
Based on "NPS Geodiversity Atlas—Salt River Bay National Historical Park and Ecological Preserve, Virgin Islands," National Park Service Geologic Resources Inventory, which cites Whetten (1966, 1968) and National Park Service (2015, 2016b); rewritten in hubnx's own words.
Licence: CC0 1.0 (public domain) · Adapted from www.nps.gov
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