A wall of stone columns 150 to 300 metres high running along the Lena river in the Sakha Republic, thickest between Petrovskoye and Tit-Ary. They are Cambrian, laid down in ancient sea basins as alternating limestone, marlstone, dolomite and slate, and the horizontal banding you can read off the cliff face is the sea coming in and going out again over millions of years. The nature park covers 1,387,000 hectares in two blocks, Buotamsky and Sinsky, and went on the UNESCO list in 2012. The climate is as extreme as the rock: -60 C in winter and +35 C in summer. Most people arrive by river cruise from Yakutsk, about 180 km away, because there is very little else out here.
Sakha Republic, Russia
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