The final blog!!!

Hello for the last time audience. To start off this final post we're briefly going to be looking at Northrend as a whole in its present state. The climate of Northrend does not vary much from one area to the next. For the most part it is very much like a polar climate with cold temperatures and very little precipiation. There is also a Tundra like climate in the southern areas of Northrend. Lets move on to the topography of Northrend for a moment. The only area in Northrend where you will find any flat land would be in Borean Tundra. Northrend is an extremely mountainous region where almost all of the land has some sort of incline. Next up, we're going to quickly look at the hydrology of Northrend. You will find very few actual rivers within Northrend since so much of the water is found in the forms of either snow or ice.

10 years in the future

In 10 years you won't see much of a physical change to the geography of Northrend. Physical change in geography takes an extremely long time to take an effect to where you can actually see something happen. Something that you will probably see is a change with the avalanche found in Sholazar Basin. The weight of all the snow will cause the front edge continue to push forward. In 10 years the avalanche will have spread farther but how much, only time can tell. After 10 years not much will change to the physical geography but we will see the avalanche creep forward. Also, 10 years from now you may see the water levels of the lakes and rivers found in the southern areas of Northrend to have increased or decreased. They would increase if the average temperature also increased since that would cause the snow to melt and drain down into these lakes and rivers. And vice-versa if temperatures were to decrease.

                                     (avalanche found in Sholozar Basin will creep forward as time passes)


100 years in the future

After 100 years have passed it will be easier for us to see some physical changes in Northrend. We may see an oxbow lake begin to form in the northern area of Howling Fjord. The northern most river is a meandering river and as time goes on the water will push against the banks and will create longer point bars and as these point bars get longer, the neck of the stream will become narrower and will eventually connect togethor. We will not see the complete formation of this oxbow lake in 100 years but we may see the start of it with the point bars becoming longer and more pronounced.

                                           (showing the start of an oxbow lake in Howling Fjord)



1000 years in the future

1000 years into the future, Northrend's geography will have changed quite a lot compared to 10 or 100 years. You will find that the mountains have grown taller as they are young in the world of Azeroth and the convergence of two continent plates will continue to push the mountains up in the sky. You may also see that the oxbow lake mentioned before may have completed. Northrend as a whole may look almost completely different in 1000 years because of storms, natural processes, or just the different races trying to bend the landscape to their will.

Hello once again ladies and gentlemen! Here's another post on the geography of Northrend in World of Warcraft.To start off, we're going to be looking at the particular climates that can be found within Northrend. For the most part, Northrend is a very cold and snowy area. This can be seen in the areas known as Ice Crown, Storm Peaks, Crystalsong, and Wintergrasp.

                                     (shows Ice Crown, Storm Peaks, Crystalsong, and Wintergrasp)

 These three zones could be classified as having a polar climate, getting very little precipitation but are very cold. You can also find a Tundra climate where its not quite as cold as the aforementioned zones but they get some precipitation in the form of rain and snow. This climate can be found in the Borean Tundra, Sholazar Basin, Grizzly Hills, and the Howling Fjord. The cold weather found in Northrend can be attributed to how far north in latitude it sits on Azeroth. If you look at a map of Azeroth, you can see that it is the northernmost continent and can be compared to the likes of the Arctic.

                                                         (shows how north Northrend is)


 Being so far north means that Northrend gets much less sunlight compared to continents that are closer to the equator and less sunlight means less warmth. Next up, we're going to be looking at the fluvial systems(rivers) of Northrend.There actually aren't too many rivers too be found within Northrend and most of them are the meandering type.The only areas that you can find rivers in Northrend are Sholazar Basin, Grizzly Hills, and Howling Fjord. Within Grizzly Hills you will find braided rivers instead of meandering rivers. As you can see, Northrend is a very cold area, similar to how the Arctic is on Earth, and does not have much of a fluvial system to be found.

(showing a braided river in Grizzly Hills)

(All pictures taken by me in game)

Hydrology and Northrend!

Hello once again ladies and gentleman. Today, for my blog on the geography of Northrend, we’re going to be focusing for the most part on the area known as Sholazar Basin and the hydrology that is involved within Sholazar Basin.

Sholazar Basin is a basin (obviously) with 5 streams coming in from different areas and each one draining off into the center of the basin called River’s Heart. Next off is the type of water that is in Sholazar Basin. Sholazar Basin’s hydrology is completely comprised of gravity water. The basin slopes inward to the center and the water collects into River’s Heart. All five of the streams that are found within Sholazar Basin are effluent streams since four of the streams are fed by waterfalls and then the fifth gets its water source from the melt off of the avalanche above it. All 5 streams have their water tables located above them. Whether it comes from the ocean located to the west of Sholazar basin (red circles), the run off from the snow at the avalanche area (black circle), or from an underground source in Wintergrasp (yellow circles), each one draining off into River's Heart (white circle).

If they were to be affluent they would have their water tables located below them. Next off we’re going to talk about insulation and how it can be reflected. Insulation that is reflected is referred to as albedo. Surface types that have albedo range from that of charcoal (which has some of the lowest albedo numbers, reflects very little light) to that of snow (which has the highest albedo numbers, reflects almost all light). An obvious surface in Sholazar that has a high albedo would be the snow from the avalanche area. You can see how easily it reflects the light.

A surface with a low albedo would be the dirty area right next to the area of the avalanche, since darker colors reflect very little light.

(All pictures taken by me in game.)

Northrend Geography No. 1

Welcome back to my blog about Northrend’s geography features. To start off we are going to be focusing on the mountain ranges located within Storm Peaks and Icecrown.

 These mountain ranges were formed due to a type of convergence. There are 3 methods of convergence including ocean crust colliding with continental crust, ocean crust colliding with ocean crust, and then continental crust colliding with continental crust. We can eliminate ocean crust colliding with ocean crust since we are speaking about mountains on a land mass. We can also eliminate ocean crust colliding with continental crust as the mountain ranges are landlocked and we are not speaking about island arcs. So this means that the form of convergence that made these mountains must be continental crust colliding with continental crust. The two plates pushing against each other create compression which in turn pushes the plates up and forms the mountains. The very steep slopes of these mountains are due to extension faults. This formation has led to Storm Peaks having mountains with the highest elevation in all of Northrend.

Introduction!

Hello! My name is Michael Allan and I will be the only one working on this blog. Currently I'm a student at UCD pursuing a major in accounting(for now at least.) The area that I have chosen for my blog is Northrend, the northern most continent in the extremely popular, but fictional, world of Warcraft(made well known by the game World of Warcraft).

(picture hosted by wowwiki.com)

 My reason for choosing Northrend was that I loved how the continent looked in game and I love how it is described in the books. I've spent quite a bit of time roaming around on Northrend and to me it is a fascinating place and has an awesome background story and great physical features. I would love to learn more about this continent and how certain formations were made.