TWO events held in the Wells area for GeoWeek were enjoyed by all who took part.

GeoWeek is a national event that introduces members of the public to their local geology, and ran for the first time this year with events across England and Scotland. Both Wells events were oversubscribed.

Twenty-one people joined Doug Robinson and Chris King for the two-hour tour of the building stone heritage in Wells on May 5. The building stones all came from the Mendip area on the city's doorstep, and tell amazing geological stories of the region's 200 million year journey from the southern tropics across the equator into northern latitudes.

The region was taken through tropical climates, deserts, shallow seas, mountainous terrain and flash floods before being invaded by Jurassic seas. All those involved were fascinated by the geological tales and what the Mendip area can tell us about global geology.

Twelve local people took part in the field visit to Deer Leap and Ebbor Gorge on May 13 to explore the geology and appreciate the Mendip scenery. Doug Robinson and Chris King modelled how the Mendip rocks were laid down and then crumpled up into the Mendip Mountains, which may have been as much as 1,500 metres high, before being worn down to produce younger rocks and the scenery of today.

This is a story of idyllic tropical seas invaded by large river deltas and coal swamps before enormous forces bent and broke the rocks to form the Mendip mountains. It was much later that the standing stones were put up, the medieval farm was developed and the coal miners came exploring – all leaving behind the signs that can be seen today.