The "Pearl-bearing Land," threaded with Mars' oldest rivers.
Margaritifer Terra is an ancient highland threaded by dense river valleys and cut by outflow channels such as Uzboi Vallis. Its name means "Pearl-bearing Land," and it holds some of the most extensive evidence for flowing water anywhere on Mars.
Claim your plot here →Few regions on Mars are as water-worn as Margaritifer Terra. Ancient valley networks branch across its highlands like the veins of a leaf, carved when rain or snowmelt ran off the early surface. Later, catastrophic floods gouged broad outflow channels — including Uzboi Vallis — that once linked chains of crater lakes.
This long, layered history of water makes Margaritifer a prime target for studying Mars' wetter past, and clay and other water-altered minerals have been detected in its rocks. The "pearl-bearing" name, inherited from early telescope maps, feels apt for a land so richly veined with rivers.