The geological formation Artés is made of continental, reddish mudstones. It inherits its name from the long cliff showing these materials that the stream of Gavarresa has cut on the slope of the mountain of Fucimanya. First description in 1971 was based on this cliff, thereof it is the stratum type and it takes the name from the close village of Artés. In addition to be the stratum of reference, the long cliff displays a delicate badlands’ erosion morphology and a beautiful landscape. Behind the cliff of reddish mudstone that is known as the stratotype of the Artés geological formation, the 2nd photo also displays on the right side the plain of Roques Albes (= white stones) that is made of lacustrine limestone and, further back in the centre, the summit of Montcogul.
The road C-25 crosses below the cliff for 2 km east of the exit to Artés, away enough for a nice view.
The rocks of geological formation Artés originate of sediments that rivers coming from mountains in the south brought on a continental plain, now known as district of Bages, between 35 and 30 millions of years ago, so from last Eocene until mid Oligocene, in Tertiary or Cenozoic. Present rocks are mainly mudstones and sandstones, though there are conglomerates that result from old channels, layers of lake limestones and, in several areas, narrow layers of fibrous gypsum as well. Its characteristic reddish colour comes from the content in iron oxide. The geological formation Artés lay out just above the geological formation Cardona of evaporites.
[photos Jordi Badia (1st) and Lídia Ribas (2nd)]