I haven't much to add to what everybody else already mentioned.
I love maps and descriptions and so of course didn't pass over this chapter. Like
Esty wrote I was also struck by the abundance of all the invented beautiful names of places and especially trees and even birds, so typical for Tolkien the Philologist and lover of trees and nature. ( I have the same interest and so I have learned many names of plants and trees in English while reading LotR. I know people that pass over those, but I looked them all up in the dictionary!!)
Concerning the interesting story of how the Mallorn trees came to Lorien, I now wonder at Haldir's words to the Fellowship in the LotR:
Quote:
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"It would be a poor life in a land where no mallorn grew. But if there are mallorn-trees beyond the Great Sea, none have reported it."
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As an island "raised from the Sea" it seems logical to me that Númenor must be of volcanic origin, and Meneltarma with its flattened and depressed top an extinct volcano.(Though the island is much larger than any volcanic islands I can think of.) If I remember rightly, in the Akallabeth it is mentioned that smoke and fire emerged from the Meneltarma right before the downfall, so apparently it was only slumbering and not extinct!
I personally wasn't put off by the description of the Númenorean worship of Eru, but found it fascinating. The quotes from Tolkien's letters that
Faramir Jones gave are very enlightening!