The landscape on Sifnos is perfect for geological mapping, with very few trees.
Accompanying us were our two supervisors, Dr Marnie Forster and Professor Gordon Lister. During the course, we developed our skills in field mapping, in a metamorphosed terrane with complex structural geology.
We worked in pairs and were assigned field areas to map.
There was an emphasis on working independently from our supervisors, and working through problems based off observations in the field.
There was no outline or lecture given for the region, but instead we were encouraged to come to our own initial observations on the various structures and geology. This was a steep learning curve for the first few days, however eventually we started to cover more and more ground and put some of the pieces of the puzzle together from the features we observed.
This approach allowed us to understand the tectonic history from what the rocks revealed, instead of making the rocks fit a particular model.