Evaluation Potentials of Sabalan Volcano Southeast slopes geological heritage by Geotourism perspective

Volcanic landform can be as terrain legacies from the past to the present era beconsidered. These heritage of land in terms of their unique characteristics can beconsidered as Geomorphosite in the scientific community and the public. Theevaluation of resources is one of the most important tasks of geotourismresearch.And thereby become profitable and thriving tourism industry in their owndistrict. Sabalan volcano mass is located in the North West of Iran, as one of themain centers of volcanic landform is considered. This volcanic mountain is one ofthe world's highest freshwater lake in the own caldera. Innovative and thoughtprovokingin the sight of the human eye development. in sabalan volcano locatedvaluable collection of geological heritage as hot mineral waters, rivers, waterfalls,lakes, beautiful valleys, erosion forms &…. Some of which are rare or even uniquein the world and they are very important in terms of geology and geotourism. Thispaper presents the method of geotourist assessment, which was applied on theexample of sites presenting the volcanic activity within Sabalan mountain range.Two stages of assessment are proposed: inventory and valorization. The inventoryincludes identification of resources, initial selection and characterization. Duringthe valorization, a researcher uses the point bonitation method and takes intoaccount the following indicators: scientific value, location and additional values.The result of valorization process is presented in table which allows comparisonand categorization of the selected sites. The assessment of considered regionrevealed, that selected sites like rock walls, rock forms, abandoned quarries andhills with ruins are characterized by high or medium geotourist value.Consequently, Sabalan is an example of area of a great potential for geotourismdevelopment.

Keywords:

geological heritage , Geotourism , volcanism , Sabalan Mts