PHYSIOGRAPHIC GEOGRAPHY 



artificial levees, hold the river channel in the center 

 of the low alluvial ridge built by the river itself. 

 The fine silt of the alluvial land on either side is ex- 

 tremely rich, and from Sacramento down stream is 

 subject to flood unless leveed. As Suisun Bay is ap- 

 proached, many of the most valuable farm lands, 

 some of them largely peat, are five to ten feet below 

 sea level. This region, the Netherlands of Cali- 

 fornia, may all be seen bv daylight if a morning 

 steamer from Sacramento is secured. 



The Coast Ranges, as has already been stated, 

 usually rise abruptly from the sea. In Washington 

 they are known as the Olympic Mountains, and in 

 southwestern Oregon and northwestern California 

 the structure and topography have caused another 

 subdivision to be set off as the Klamath Province. 

 The other sections are commonly spoken of as the 

 Coast Ranges of Oregon or of California. The Coast 

 Ranges, as a whole, somewhat exceed the Appalach- 

 ian Mountains in elevation. The peaks of the 

 Olympic and the Klamath ranges rise to 9000 feet 

 and over, and south of Monterey Bay, Santa Lucia 

 Peak of the California Coast Ranges is about six 

 thousand feet above the sea. In southern California 

 the Sierra Madre is commonly accepted as part of 

 the Coast Ranges, notwithstanding a change in trend 

 and their distance from the sea. In the ranges of 

 the Sierra Madre the highest peak is over eleven 

 thousand feet in elevation. 



Space for physiography in this guide book has 

 been pages where volumes are needed. The Coast 

 Range Province, like the others, must be passed 

 with brief reference to features of special interest. 

 Possibly the most striking fact is that the Coast 

 Ranges have been so recently uplifted from the 

 ocean that the seaward front still shows at intervals 

 from San Diego to Portland the successive shore- 

 lines deeply scored by the waves during the stand- 

 still of the land between successive uplifts. Yet if 

 Mpunt Tamalpais, just north of Golden Gate, be 

 climbed, the magnificent panoramic view from the 

 top shows San Francisco Bay most plainly as a 

 drowned valley made by recent subsidence which 

 has admitted the sea through the gorge that was 

 formerly the old mouth of the Sacramento (Lawson, 

 1914). In contrast with this view of local subsid- 

 ence, if the railroad be taken to Santa Cruz (three 

 hours away), the coast for ten or fifteen miles to 

 the westward shows four broad old ocean strands 

 with their former sea cliffs at the rear, the whole 

 rising like steps of a giant stair-case to some seven 

 hundred feet from the present ocean level (Lawson, 



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