Snowdon Peak is a mountain summit located in
San Juan County,
Colorado,
United States.
It is situated seven miles south of the community of
Silverton, in the
Weminuche Wilderness, on land managed by
San Juan National Forest. It is part of the
San Juan Mountains range which is a subset of the
Rocky Mountains of
North America
North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...
, and is set nine miles west of the
Continental Divide
A continental divide is a drainage divide on a continent such that the drainage basin on one side of the divide feeds into one ocean or sea, and the basin on the other side either feeds into a different ocean or sea, or else is endorheic, not ...
.
Topographic relief is significant as the east aspect rises above the
Animas River
Animas River (''On-e-mas''; es, Río de las Ánimas) is a river in the western United States, a tributary of the San Juan River (Colorado River), San Juan River, part of the Colorado River, Colorado River System.
The Animas-La Plata Water Pro ...
in approximately 1.5 mile. Neighbors include
Mount Garfield three miles to the east-southeast, and
Twilight Peak
Twilight Peak is the highest summit of the West Needle Mountains range of the San Juan Mountains System in southwestern Colorado.
The prominent peak is located in the Weminuche Wilderness of San Juan National Forest, south-southwest ( be ...
, which is the nearest higher peak, 3.7 miles to the south-southwest. This mountain can be seen from
U.S. Route 550
U.S. Route 550 (US 550) is a spur of U.S. Highway 50 that runs from Bernalillo, New Mexico to Montrose, Colorado in the western United States. The section from Silverton to Ouray is frequently called the Million Dollar Highway. . The mountain is named after
Snowdon
Snowdon () or (), is the highest mountain in Wales, at an elevation of above sea level, and the highest point in the British Isles outside the Scottish Highlands. It is located in Snowdonia National Park (') in Gwynedd (historic ...
, the highest mountain in
Wales.
Climate
According to the
Köppen climate classification system, Snowdon Peak is located in an alpine
subarctic climate
The subarctic climate (also called subpolar climate, or boreal climate) is a climate with long, cold (often very cold) winters, and short, warm to cool summers. It is found on large landmasses, often away from the moderating effects of an ocean, ge ...
zone with long, cold, snowy winters, and cool to warm summers.
Due to its altitude, it receives precipitation all year, as snow in winter, and as thunderstorms in summer, with a dry period in late spring. Precipitation
runoff
Runoff, run-off or RUNOFF may refer to:
* RUNOFF, the first computer text-formatting program
* Runoff or run-off, another name for bleed, printing that lies beyond the edges to which a printed sheet is trimmed
* Runoff or run-off, a stock market ...
from the mountain drains into tributaries of the Animas River.
Geology
Snowdon Peak is part of the
Uncompahgre Formation
The Uncompahgre Formation is a geologic formation in Colorado. Its radiometric age is between 1707 and 1704 Ma, corresponding to the Statherian period.
History
The formation was first named by Charles Whitman Cross and Ernest Howe in 1905 ...
, which is a sequence of
quartzite and black
phyllite some in thickness.
[Rob Blair, Tom Ann Casey, William H. Romme, ''The Western San Juan Mountains: Their Geology, Ecology, and Human History'', 1996, University Press of Colorado, , page 350.] The formation dates to the
Statherian period and is interpreted as metamorphosed marine and fluvial
sandstone,
mudstone
Mudstone, a type of mudrock, is a fine-grained sedimentary rock whose original constituents were clays or muds. Mudstone is distinguished from '' shale'' by its lack of fissility (parallel layering).Blatt, H., and R.J. Tracy, 1996, ''Petrology. ...
, and
shale
Shale is a fine-grained, clastic sedimentary rock formed from mud that is a mix of flakes of clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolin, Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4) and tiny fragments (silt-sized particles) of other minerals, especial ...
. The formation overlies plutons with an age of 1,707 million years.
Gallery
File:12,628' and Snowdon Peak.jpg, 12,628' (left) and Snowdon Peak (right)
File:Snowdon Peak from US Route 550.jpg, Snowdon Peak from US Route 550
File:Snowdon Peak, US Highway 550 - Colorado.jpg, Snowdon Peak from Highway 550
File:View from the Molas Pass Overlook, almost 11,000 feet high in the San Juan Mountains of southern Colorado LCCN2015632700.tif, Snowdon Peak from Molas Pass
File:Snowdon Peak at Night.jpg, Snowdon Peak illuminated by moonlight
File:Snowdon Peak SW.jpg, Snowden Peak to left. West aspect, from near Coal Bank Pass
File:Mount Snowdon, Colorado, USA.jpg
File:Snowdon Peak CO.jpg, Snowdon Peak to the right
File:San Juan Mountains in Colorado.jpg
See also
*
References
External links
* Weather forecast
Snowdon Peak{{Mountains of Colorado
Mountains of San Juan County, Colorado
San Juan Mountains (Colorado)
Mountains of Colorado
North American 3000 m summits
San Juan National Forest