the tar pits

so for four years, i passed by the tar pits on the bus. just a big pool of tar, i thought to myself, not a big deal.


but it is!

it's a big pool of tar in the middle of a city...and before the city was built, it was a big pool of tar that trapped thousands of animals! wolves, saber-tooth cats, woolly mammoths, unnecessarily large ground sloths...it's really sad when you think about all the animal lives that were lost because they unknowingly wandered into tar. here is a re-creation at the tar pits:


the even weirder thing is that they lived in los angeles. it's just hard to imagine them here because when i think about LA, i think about hollywood and beaches...i can't imagine a woolly mammoth living in the city. what if i looked outside my window and saw one? i would probably feed it something, then ask if i could sit on its back. imagine riding on a woolly mammoth...that would be pretty sweet...


sorry that was a tangent. but anyway, the tar pits were pretty awesome. we walked around the tar pits, took a look inside the museum (free for SC students!) and then explored the grounds...and soon discovered that the tar is still very much alive and bubbling!