Hello all of my readers, and welcome to the Great Rift Valley in Africa, the result of a divergent boundary separating the African Plate into two plates. Divergent boundaries are the boundaries between plates that are moving apart. Usually these two plates are oceanic plates, creating mid-ocean ridges. There is usually volcanic and earthquake activity at these divergent boundaries.

A divergent boundary in the ocean

In this case, though, the divergent plates are both continental. Earthquakes can occur, but not volcanos, because it is not exposing magma. Continental-continental boundaries creates giant rift valleys and some of the deepest, largest, and oldest lakes in the world. It is one of these lakes I am going to visit, called the African Great Lakes or Rift Valley Lakes. The Rift Valley Lakes are located in the East African Rift, created about 40 million years ago.

A beautiful picture of Lake Victoria

The one I am visiting, the massive Lake Victoria, is the biggest lake of all of the Rift Valley Lakes, and the third biggest freshwater lake in the world. Lake Victoria is characterized in part by its cichlid population, which is incredible. Cichlids are a large, diverse family of fish with many, many species. There are many cichlids here, but even more were here before exotic fish were introduced, driving some species to extinction. This isn't the only environmental problem Lake Victoria is facing, unfortunately - many of the cities and towns around it are dumping their raw sewage in it. There are many other problems, but I'm not going to depress you with all that.

The third part of my journey has been educational, but a little sad. I hope that my next visit to sunny "hotspot" Hawaii will cheer me up and relax me. See you there.

Photos: http://tectonicplates1.blogspot.com/
             http://www.exploration-online.co.uk/article.php?id=5