ABSTRACT
Geography: Coast Range Mountains (from north to south: Yolla Bolly, King, Diablo, Santa Cruz, Gabilan, Santa Lucia, Sierra Madre, and San Rafael)
Elevation: Solomon Peak, Trinity County: 2312 m (7583 feet)
Mt. Tamalpais, Marin County: 784 m (2571 feet)
Cone Peak, Monterey County: 1572 m (5155 feet)
Mt. Linn, Yolla Bolly Mountains: 2468 m (8096 feet)
Major watercourses: Klamath River, Eel River, Russian River, Salinas River, Humboldt Bay, San Francisco Bay
Predominant rocks: Mesozoic Franciscan Complex, Cenozoic sedimentary basins
Plate tectonic setting: Accretionary wedge complex of the Sierra Nevada arc
Geologic resources: Water, sand, gravel; mercury; natural gas and oil
National parks: Redwood National Park, Point Reyes National Seashore, Golden Gate National Recreation Area
State parks: Jedediah Smith Redwoods, Prairie Creek, Humboldt Redwoods, Big Sur, Guadalupe Dunes
The Coast Ranges are not impressively high mountain ranges, like the Cascades or the Sierra Nevada mountains. In most cases, they form low rolling hills or smaller mountains that rise from the Pacific Ocean. Only a few are more than a mile in elevation. Most are about 1000 m (3300 feet) or lower. The entire Coast Ranges extend over 640 km (400 miles) from the Oregon border to the north edge of the Transverse Ranges (Figure 12.1). The width of the range in the east-west direction varies from place to place, but typically it is about 160 km (100 miles) wide from the Pacific Ocean to the Great Valley. The Coast Ranges merge with the Klamaths at the north
side, and are bounded by the Central Valley on the east and the Transverse Ranges to the south.
