Stevens Peak is a mountain

summit A summit is a point on a surface that is higher in elevation than all points immediately adjacent to it. The topographic terms acme, apex, peak (mountain peak), and zenith are synonymous. The term (mountain top) is generally used only for ...

located in Alpine County,

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

, United States.

Description

This landmark of Hope Valley is set south of

South Lake Tahoe South Lake Tahoe is the most populous incorporated city in El Dorado County, California, United States, in the Sierra Nevada mountains. The city's population was 21,330 at the 2020 census, down from 21,403 at the 2010 census. The city, along the ...

, on land managed by

Humboldt–Toiyabe National Forest The Humboldt–Toiyabe National Forest (HTNF) is the principal National forest (United States), U.S. National Forest in the U.S. state of Nevada, and has a smaller portion further west in Eastern California in the state of California. With an a ...

. Stevens Peak is situated in 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 ...

mountain range, with precipitation runoff from the peak's east slope draining to the West Fork

Carson River The Carson River is a northwestern Nevada river that empties into the Carson Sink, an endorheic basin. The main stem of the river is long although the addition of the East Fork makes the total length , traversing five counties: Alpine Count ...

, whereas the west slope drains into the Upper Truckee River. The summit is situated north of

line parent A peak's line parent is the closest higher peak on the highest ridge leading away from the peak's "key col". A col is the lowest point on the ridge between two summits and is roughly synonymous with pass, gap, saddle and notch. The highest col ...

Red Lake Peak Red Lake Peak (elevation ) is believed to be the vantage point from which John C. Fremont and Charles Preuss made the first recorded sighting of Lake Tahoe by Europeans in February 1844 as Fremont's exploratory expedition made a desperate crossi ...

, and north of

Carson Pass Carson Pass is a mountain pass on the crest of the central Sierra Nevada, in the Eldorado National Forest and Alpine County, eastern California. The pass is traversed by California State Route 88. It lies on the Great Basin Divide, with the W ...

Topographic relief Terrain (), alternatively relief or topographical relief, is the dimension and shape of a given surface of land. In physical geography, terrain is the lay of the land. This is usually expressed in terms of the elevation, slope, and orientati ...

is significant as the east aspect rises above

California State Route 88 State Route 88 (SR 88), also known as the Carson Pass Highway, is a state highway in the U.S. state of California. It travels in an east–west direction from Stockton, California, Stockton, in the San Joaquin Valley, to the Nevada state l ...

in 1.5 mile.

History

John C. Frémont Major general (United States), Major-General John Charles Frémont (January 21, 1813July 13, 1890) was a United States Army officer, explorer, and politician. He was a United States senator from California and was the first History of the Repub ...

was the first European-American to see Lake Tahoe, during his second exploratory expedition. He and

Charles Preuss George Karl Ludwig Preuss (1803–1854), anglicized as Charles Preuss, was a surveyor and cartographer who accompanied John C. Fremont on three of his five exploratory expeditions of the American west, including the expedition where he and Fremont ...

saw the lake from the summit of what was likely Stevens Peak (or possibly Red Lake Peak) on February 14, 1844. This landform's toponym has been officially adopted by the U.S. Board on Geographic Names, and has been in use since at least 1896 when published by the Sierra Club. The name honors Alpine County supervisor J. M. Stevens who operated a

stage station A stage station or relay station, also known as a staging post, a posting station, or a stage stop, is a facility along a main road or trade route where a traveller can rest and/or replace exhausted working animals (mostly horse riding, riding h ...

in Hope Valley from 1864 through 1866.Peter Browning, ''Place Names of the Sierra Nevada: From Abbot to Zumwalt'', 1986, Wilderness Press, , p. 209. The

USGS The United States Geological Survey (USGS), founded as the Geological Survey, is an government agency, agency of the United States Department of the Interior, U.S. Department of the Interior whose work spans the disciplines of biology, geograp ...

surveyed this area in 1889 and labelled the geographic feature on their map.

Climate

According to the

Köppen climate classification The Köppen climate classification divides Earth climates into five main climate groups, with each group being divided based on patterns of seasonal precipitation and temperature. The five main groups are ''A'' (tropical), ''B'' (arid), ''C'' (te ...

system, Stevens Peak is located in an

alpine climate Alpine climate is the typical climate for elevations above the tree line, where trees fail to grow due to cold. This climate is also referred to as a mountain climate or highland climate. Definition There are multiple definitions of alpine cli ...

zone. Most

weather front A weather front is a boundary separating air masses for which several characteristics differ, such as air density, wind, temperature, and humidity. Disturbed and unstable weather due to these differences often arises along the boundary. For ins ...

s originate in the

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five Borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is ...

and travel east toward the Sierra Nevada mountains. As fronts approach, they are forced upward by the peaks (

orographic lift Orographic lift occurs when an air mass is forced from a low elevation to a higher elevation as it moves over rising terrain. As the air mass gains altitude it quickly cools down adiabatically, which can raise the relative humidity to 100% and cr ...

), causing them to drop their moisture in the form of rain or snowfall onto the range.

Gallery

File:Stevens Peaks in winter.jpg, North aspect in winter, from Waterhouse Peak File:Stevens Peak, Hope Valley, California.jpg, Northeast aspect of Stevens Peak from Hope Valley File:Fall colors in Hope Valley, California.jpg, Southeast aspect File:Stevens Peak in Hope Valley.jpg, East aspect of Stevens Peak in Hope Valley File:Stevens Peak, Hope Valley.jpg, Southeast aspect File:Stevens Peak across Hope Valley.jpeg, Northeast aspect of Stevens Peak (right of center) from Hope Valley File:Stevens Peak, ne.jpg, Northeast aspect of Stevens Peak (right) from Hope Valley. Red Lake Peak to left. File:Hope Valley - Stevens Peak.jpg, Northeast aspect of Stevens Peak from Hope Valley

Notes

Lidar Lidar (, also LIDAR, an acronym of "light detection and ranging" or "laser imaging, detection, and ranging") is a method for determining ranging, ranges by targeting an object or a surface with a laser and measuring the time for the reflected li ...

measurements show the summit elevation to be 10,051 feet and prominence as 549 feet. *Stevens Peak blocks some of the view of Lake Tahoe from Red Lake Peak. (

Google Earth Google Earth is a web mapping, web and computer program created by Google that renders a 3D computer graphics, 3D representation of Earth based primarily on satellite imagery. The program maps the Earth by superimposition, superimposing satelli ...

)

References

{{reflist

External links

* Weather forecast
Stevens Peak
Three-thousanders of the United States Mountains of Northern California Mountains of the Sierra Nevada (United States) Mountains of Alpine County, California Humboldt–Toiyabe National Forest