ABSTRACT
High plateaux surrounded by peaks are a feature of the Cretan mountains. Omalos is the second largest of them, after Lasithi in the east, but it is the highest. It lies at the head of the vast Samaria gorge which falls from it to the sea on the south coast 16 km away (Fig. 7.1). The plain is 1045 to 1110 m in altitude and the steep slopes of the surrounding mountains of hard limestone reach heights ranging between 1120 and 1993 m. It is filled with hill erosion sediments of fine gravel and silt, fine sand, as well as dust blown from the Sahara to a depth of at least 10 m in places and with a thin, hard layer of bog iron ore. Much of the sediment is cemented. The gravel contains fragments of phyllite and quartzite. The losses of silt through swallow-holes are balanced by deposition of Saharan dust and inputs from erosion. The rivers of the Omalos drain into swallow-holes in the floor of the plain which are the most impressive of their kind in Crete. Topographical map of the Omalos https://s3-euw1-ap-pe-df-pch-content-public-p.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/9780203220894/7aa6ff7a-81da-4c32-a1b2-667754d2d7f1/content/fig7_1_B.jpg" xmlns:xlink="https://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"/>
