May 14 2025
🏔️ Overview The White Mountains are a spectacular high-desert mountain range rising along the eastern side of California’s Owens Valley and extending northward toward the Nevada border. Although they stand less than 20 miles east of parts of the Sierra Nevada, the White Mountains have a dramatically different character. Instead of deeply glaciated granite valleys …
May 14 2025
🏔️ Overview The Wrangell Mountains are a spectacular group of high, heavily glaciated volcanic mountains in eastern Alaska. Rising above the Copper River Basin, the range contains enormous shield volcanoes, deeply eroded volcanic massifs, active geothermal features, and some of the highest summits in the United States. Most of the range lies within Wrangell–St. Elias …
May 14 2025
🏔️ Overview Breckenridge Ski Resort is one of Colorado’s largest and highest ski areas, spreading across five interconnected peaks of the Tenmile Range above the historic town of Breckenridge. Rather than occupying a single mountain, the resort extends across Peaks 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10, creating an unusually varied landscape of groomed slopes, forests, …
May 13 2025
🏔️ Overview The Toiyabe Range is a long, rugged mountain range in central Nevada, extending through parts of Nye and Lander counties. Rising from the broad desert valleys of the Great Basin, the range forms one of Nevada’s most impressive north–south mountain barriers. The Toiyabe Range stretches for roughly 117 miles (188 kilometers) from north …
May 13 2025
Rising above the deeply eroded ridges of western Oʻahu, Kaʻala—often called Mount Kaʻala—is the highest mountain on the island. Its summit is commonly listed by Hawaiʻi state agencies at 4,025 feet (1,227 meters) above sea level, making it the crowning point of the Waiʻanae Range. Kaʻala is very different from the broad volcanic summits of …
May 13 2025
Southern California is home to one of the most unusual mountain systems in the western United States: the Transverse Ranges. Unlike most of California’s major mountain chains, which generally follow a northwest-to-southeast alignment, the Transverse Ranges extend primarily from west to east. This unusual orientation is more than a geographic curiosity. It reflects millions of …
May 13 2025
🏔️ Overview The Teton Range, commonly called the Tetons, is one of the most recognizable mountain ranges in the American West. Rising abruptly above Jackson Hole in northwestern Wyoming, its jagged summits, deep glacial canyons, alpine lakes, and exposed rock faces form the dramatic centerpiece of Grand Teton National Park. The range is part of …
May 11 2025
The Tenmile Range is a compact but remarkably high mountain chain in central Colorado, rising immediately west of Breckenridge and extending south from the Frisco area toward some of the highest terrain in Summit County. Although considerably shorter than many of Colorado’s major mountain ranges, the Tenmile Range contains rugged thirteeners, a famous fourteener, glacial …
May 10 2025
The Elk Mountains are one of the most dramatic and rugged ranges in Colorado. Rising southwest of Aspen in the west-central part of the state, they form part of the Southern Rocky Mountains and contain a remarkable concentration of steep fourteeners, glacial valleys, alpine lakes, colorful sedimentary rock, and extensive wilderness. The range is perhaps …
May 10 2025
The Great Smoky Mountains, often called the Smokies, form one of the highest and most biologically diverse mountain ranges in the eastern United States. Rising along the border between Tennessee and North Carolina, they are part of the Blue Ridge Mountains and the much larger Appalachian Mountain system. Dense forests cover nearly every ridge and …
