I was also trying to get a grasp on how big those ripples actually are to my scale. I can see with my eyes on the coastline how nature works in what I perhaps incorrectly think of as fractals, nearly identical formations differing only in scale. It sure looks like evidence of water to me!! I wonder … what would it be like to swim in water that had one third the gravity you’d expect?

janyuary: You might be right, but you have to always remind yourself when looking at images of the surface of Mars that the gravity is one-third that of Earth’s. The formation of ripples is going to be fundamentally changed by that fact.

There has been a lot of research done on sand ripples on Mars. If you do a search on BtB just for “ripples” you will get a hint. A lot of it deals with how these change, or not, as well as comparing the tiny ripples from the big ones. Some are moving, some are frozen in place.

… the right hand side, top to bottom, of the photo has the unique look of what sand does underwater only. Those distinct ripples are NOT duplicated in windblown sand at any time that I have ever seen, (I was born and raised exploring and enjoying some of of the largest sand dunes on the West Coast).

For what it’s worth — on earth, I’d look at that sand and know, “These ripples were formed while this sand was underwater.”