The Plains of Leon are named for the former

gold mining Gold mining is the extraction of gold resources by mining. Historically, mining gold from alluvial deposits used manual separation processes, such as gold panning. However, with the expansion of gold mining to ores that are not on the surface, ...

town,

Leon Leon, Léon (French) or León (Spanish) may refer to: Places Europe * León, Spain, capital city of the Province of León * Province of León, Spain * Kingdom of León, an independent state in the Iberian Peninsula from 910 to 1230 and again f ...

once located near the middle of the plain. It is a

plain In geography, a plain is a flat expanse of land that generally does not change much in elevation, and is primarily treeless. Plains occur as lowlands along valleys or at the base of mountains, as coastal plains, and as plateaus or uplands ...

in the

Perris Block The Perris Block is the central block of three major Fault block, fault-bounded blocks of the northern part of the Peninsular Ranges. The Perris Block lies between the Santa Ana Block to the west and the San Jacinto Block to the east. The Perris B ...

, contiguous on the south with the Perris Plain including within it the Domenigoni Valley and western Diamond Valley, French Valley, Auld Valley, the upper part of the valley of Warm Springs Creek and connecting tablelands.Elmer Wallace Holmes, History of Riverside County, California: With Biographical Sketches of the Leading Men and Women of the County who Have Been Identified with Its Growth and Development from the Early Days to the Present, Historic Record Company, Riverside County, 1912, p.140 The Plains of Leon are bounded on the west by the Paloma Valley, the southeastern

Temescal Mountains Temescal Mountains, also known as the Sierra Temescal (Spanish for " sweat lodge range"), are one of the northernmost mountain ranges of the Peninsular Ranges in western Riverside County, in Southern California in the United States. They extend ...

and the valley of Warm Springs Creek after it drops below the level of the tablelands of the plains. On the north by Menifee Valley and the Domenigoni Mountains, on the south it extends to include French Valley, Auld Valley and the tablelands between them. It is bounded on the south by Tucalota Creek (originally Alamos Creek), and the level land west of it to Warm Springs Creek and northeast of Murrieta Hot Springs. To the east it was originally bounded by the eastern Diamond Valley, Rawson Mountains, Bachelor Mountain, Black Mountain, and

Tucalota Hills The Tucalota Hills are a low mountain range of the Peninsular Ranges System, in Riverside County, California. Geography They are located east of Lake Skinner reservoir, southwest of Hemet, northeast of Temecula. Diamond Valley reservoir fills ...

. However, now Diamond Valley is bounded on the east by the West Dam of the

Diamond Valley Lake Diamond Valley Lake is a man-made off-stream reservoir located near Hemet, California, United States. It is one of the largest reservoirs in Southern California and also one of the newest. With a capacity of , the lake nearly doubled the area's s ...

. Auld Valley is now bounded to the east by

Skinner Reservoir Skinner Reservoir, also known as Lake Skinner, is a reservoir in western Riverside County, California, located at the foot of Bachelor Mountain in the Auld Valley, approximately northeast of Temecula. It was created in 1973 by the construction o ...

south of Bachelor Mountain on Tucalota Creek. Unlike the Perris Plain, which lies within the watershed of the San Jacinto River, the Plains of Leon are drained by Warm Springs Creek, French Valley Creek and Tucalota Creek, tributaries of Murrieta Creek and its parent the

Santa Margarita River The Santa Margarita River which with the addition of what is now Temecula Creek, was formerly known as the Temecula River, is a short intermittent river on the Pacific coast of southern California in the United States, approximately U.S. Geologi ...

.USGS 1:24K topographic map, Winchester, CA.

References

Landforms of Riverside County, California Plains of the United States {{RiversideCountyCA-geo-stub