Cathedral Peak is part of the

Cathedral Range The Cathedral Range is a mountain range immediately to the south of Tuolumne Meadows in Yosemite National Park. The range is an offshoot of the Sierra Nevada. The range is named after Cathedral Peak, which resembles a cathedral spire. Geograp ...

, a mountain range in the south-central portion of

Yosemite National Park Yosemite National Park ( ) is a List of national parks of the United States, national park of the United States in California. It is bordered on the southeast by Sierra National Forest and on the northwest by Stanislaus National Forest. The p ...

in eastern Mariposa and Tuolumne Counties. The range is an offshoot of the

Sierra Nevada The Sierra Nevada ( ) is a mountain range in the Western United States, between the Central Valley of California and the Great Basin. The vast majority of the range lies in the state of California, although the Carson Range spur lies primari ...

. The peak which lends its name to the range derives its name from its

cathedral A cathedral is a church (building), church that contains the of a bishop, thus serving as the central church of a diocese, Annual conferences within Methodism, conference, or episcopate. Churches with the function of "cathedral" are usually s ...

-shaped peak, which was formed by

glacial A glacier (; or ) is a persistent body of dense ice, a form of rock, that is constantly moving downhill under its own weight. A glacier forms where the accumulation of snow exceeds its ablation over many years, often centuries. It acquires ...

activity: the peak remained uneroded above the glaciers in the

Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( ; referred to colloquially as the ''ice age, Ice Age'') is the geological epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was fin ...

Geography

Cathedral Peak has a subsidiary summit to the west called Eichorn Pinnacle, for

Jules Eichorn Jules Marquard Eichorn (February 7, 1912 – February 15, 2000) was an American mountaineer, environmentalist, and music teacher. Early years Jules Marquard Eichorn was born in San Francisco on February 7, 1912, to Hilmar and Frieda Eichorn, w ...

, who first ascended a class 5.4 route to its summit on July 24, 1931, with Glen Dawson. In 1869,

John Muir John Muir ( ; April 21, 1838December 24, 1914), also known as "John of the Mountains" and "Father of the national park, National Parks", was a Scottish-born American naturalist, author, environmental philosopher, botanist, zoologist, glaciologi ...

wrote in ''My first summer in the Sierra'':

Geology

The

Cathedral Peak Granodiorite The Cathedral Peak Granodiorite (CPG) was named after its type locality, Cathedral Peak in Yosemite National Park, California. The granodiorite forms part of the Tuolumne Intrusive Suite (Tuolumne Batholith), one of the four major intrusive sui ...

of Cathedral Peak is an

intrusion In geology, an igneous intrusion (or intrusive body or simply intrusion) is a body of intrusive igneous rock that forms by crystallization of magma slowly cooling below the surface of the Earth. Intrusions have a wide variety of forms and com ...

into an area of older intrusive (or plutonic) and metamorphic rock in the

Sierra Nevada Batholith The Sierra Nevada Batholith is a large batholith that is approximately 400 miles long and 60-80 miles wide which forms the core of the Sierra Nevada mountain range in California, exposed at the surface as granite. The batholith is composed of ...

. It is part of a grouping of intrusions called the Tuolumne Intrusive Suite. Cathedral Peak is the youngest of the rock formations in the Suite, dating to the

Cretaceous The Cretaceous ( ) is a geological period that lasted from about 143.1 to 66 mya (unit), million years ago (Mya). It is the third and final period of the Mesozoic Era (geology), Era, as well as the longest. At around 77.1 million years, it is the ...

Period at 83 million years ago. Its composition is mainly

granodiorite Granodiorite ( ) is a coarse-grained (phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock similar to granite, but containing more plagioclase feldspar than orthoclase feldspar. The term banatite is sometimes used informally for various rocks ranging from gra ...

with

phenocryst image:montblanc granite phenocrysts.JPG, 300px, Granites often have large feldspar, feldspathic phenocrysts. This granite, from the Switzerland, Swiss side of the Mont Blanc massif, has large white phenocrysts of plagioclase (that have trapezoid sh ...

s of

microcline Microcline (KAlSi3O8) is an important igneous rock-forming tectosilicate mineral. It is a potassium-rich alkali feldspar. Microcline typically contains minor amounts of sodium. It is common in granite and pegmatites. Microcline forms during s ...

. Cathedral Peak was a

nunatak A nunatak (from Inuit language, Inuit ) is the summit or ridge of a mountain that protrudes from an ice field or glacier that otherwise covers most of the mountain or ridge. They often form natural pyramidal peaks. Isolated nunataks are also cal ...

during the Tioga glaciation of the last ice age, the peak projected above the

glaciers A glacier (; or ) is a persistent body of dense ice, a form of rock, that is constantly moving downhill under its own weight. A glacier forms where the accumulation of snow exceeds its ablation over many years, often centuries. It acquires ...

, which carved and sharpened the peak's base while plucking away at its sides. CathedralPeakCA

References

External links

* * {{Authority control Geology of Yosemite National Park Mountains of Yosemite National Park Mountains of Mariposa County, California Mountains of Tuolumne County, California Igneous intrusions Mountains of Northern California Cretaceous magmatism Igneous petrology of California

Geography

Geology

See also

References

External links