Sierra NevadaRange Type | Mountain range with well-recognized name | Highest Point | Mount Whitney (14,498 ft/4419 m) | Countries | United States | States/Provinces | California (98%), Nevada (2%) (numbers are approximate percentage of range area) | Area | 39,612 sq mi / 102,594 sq km Area may include lowland areas | Extent | 389 mi / 626 km North-South 231 mi / 372 km East-West | Center Lat/Long | 37° 36' N; 119° 59' W | Map Link | Microsoft Bing Map | Search Engines - search the web for "Sierra Nevada": Wikipedia Search Microsoft Bing Search Google Search Yahoo Search
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The Sierra Nevada, John Muir's "Range of Light", is perhaps the most beautiful single range in the contiguous United States, as well as the highest and longest. The Rockies may be longer, but do not have the unified and contiuous mass the Sierra presents. On shaded relief maps, the huge elongate blob of the Sierra, rising from the flat Central Valley on the west and the deserts of the Great Basin on the east, stands out strikingly as a truly enormous and important mountain grouping.
Even though Colorado has 54 peaks over 14,000 feet to the 11 in the Sierra, and only Mount Whitney rises higher than the highest summits in the Rockies, it can still claim to be the highest range in the 48 states. It is also much more of a climber's range than most others in the American west, with a huge variety of technical rock routes and fair number of summits where ascents require serious mountaineering skill by the easiest route. The only serious mountain element lacking in the Sierra is real glaciation.
Since the Sierra is one long, uninterrupted crest utterly without major geographical or political boundaries crossing it, subdividing the range is bound to be an arbitrary exercise. The PEMRACS attempts to chop things up, but the sub-ranges presented here are nothing more than one person's vain attempt to impose an order that is not really there.
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Map of Sierra Nevada Click on red triangle icons for links to other ranges.
Note: Range borders shown on map are an approximation and are not authoritative. Click Here for a Full Screen Map
| Other Ranges: To go to pages for other ranges either click on the map above, or on range names in the hierarchy snapshot below, which show the parent, siblings, and children of the Sierra Nevada. | |
Major Peaks of the Sierra NevadaTen Highest Peaks | Rank | Peak Name | ft | m | Range4 | 1. | Mount Whitney | 14,498 | 4419 | Sequoia Sierra Nevada | 2. | Mount Williamson | 14,373 | 4381 | Sequoia Sierra Nevada | 3. | North Palisade | 14,242 | 4341 | Central Sierra Nevada | 4. | Mount Sill | 14,153 | 4314 | Central Sierra Nevada | 5. | East Williamson Horn | 14,108+ | 4300+ | Sequoia Sierra Nevada | 6. | Mount Russell | 14,088 | 4294 | Sequoia Sierra Nevada | 7. | Polemonium Peak | 14,080+ | 4292+ | Central Sierra Nevada | 8. | Split Mountain | 14,058 | 4285 | Central Sierra Nevada | 9. | Mount Langley | 14,026 | 4275 | Sequoia Sierra Nevada | 10. | Mount Tyndall | 14,019 | 4273 | Sequoia Sierra Nevada | Sub-peaks are excluded from this list. List may not be complete, since only summits in the PBC Database are included. |
Photos of Peaks in the Sierra Nevada
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