Klamath Mountains & Trinity Alps

A tangle of ranges with no dominant grain, close enough to the ocean to take very heavy winter rain and high enough to hold it as snow. The result is dense forest on extremely steep slopes, cut by rivers — the Klamath, the Trinity, the Salmon, the Smith — that rise ferociously during atmospheric rivers. In late summer, dry thunderstorms move up from the south over fuel that has had no rain since May, and the Klamath reliably produces multi-fire lightning sieges.

Elevation range

300 ft → 9,037 ftHigh point: Thompson Peak

Relief

8,737 ftTop to bottom, inside this region

Span

99 × 141 miEast–west by north–south

Annual rainfall

35–90″Driest to wettest ground here

Köppen types

CsbDsb4 counties