Sirik Desert

Sirik is a city in Hormozgan Province in southern Iran and the capital of Sirik County. The city lies 20 kilometres south of Sirik County and close to the Sirik desert area. The region sits just east of the Strait of Hormuz, where the Gulf of Oman begins. Along the eastern edge of the road from Sirik to the port of Jask, you can see eroded forms among the scattered heights, which are rare of their kind. Shaped by water and wind erosion, these formations look like mushrooms and are known by names such as the Giant's Mace (Gorz-e Div), hoodoos, and the Jinn's Chimney (Dudkesh-e Jen).

On the coastal plain east of the Strait of Hormuz, the loose, weak formations and the effects of wind and water erosion have created these mushroom-shaped forms, which are named for their resemblance to chimneys and maces. They continue naturally as far as the miniature mountains of the port of Jask and are among the unique features of this region.

From the north of the Strait of Hormuz eastward, along the Zagros Mountains, the character of the terrain changes markedly. Here the regular structural ranges and the plains between them give way to tangled, faulted masses. This unit lies between the Jazmurian Depression in the north and the Gulf of Oman in the south, and its elevation decreases from north to south. The most important feature of the region is Bashagard, and the shape of its folds is directly related to the type and hardness of the rock layers. The age of the sediments becomes younger from north to south, and faulting and erosion have had a great influence on the present landforms.