The outcropping rock around Cles is almost exclusively sedimentary and formed over hundreds of millions of years through slow deposition of clay, sand, and other materials on the beds of ancient seas that once covered the area.
The imposing rock face of Faè exhibits two clearly defined “strata” of sedimentary rock in cross-section, easily distinguished by appearance and colour.
The imposing vertical section of wall consists entirely of Main Dolomite, a rock that formed at the bottom of the sea around 224 to 232 million years ago and that today comprises the upper component of the Dolomites, extending more or less without interruption from Lombardy in Italy to Slovenia. The lower section of the wall, the first 20 to 30 m of thickness, has multicoloured layers shading through red, violet, and yellow, consisting of an alternation of clay, marl, and other types of easily eroded rocks.
