The Olympic Mountains are a mountain range on the Olympic Peninsula of western Washington in the United States. The mountains are not especially high - Mount Olympus is the highest at - but the western slopes of the Olympics face the Pacific Ocean and are thus the wettest place in the 48 contiguous states; the Hoh Ranger Station in the Hoh Rain Forest records an average of 360 cm (142 in) of rainfall each year. Most of the mountains are protected within the bounds of the Olympic National Park. Physiographically, they are a section of the larger Pacific Border province, which in turn are part of the larger Pacific Mountain System physiographic division.

The mountains were originally called "Sun-a-do" by the Duwamish Indians, while the first European to see them, the Spanish navigator Juan Perez, named them "Sierra Nevada de Santa Rosalia", in 1774. But the English captain John Meares, seeing them in 1788, thought them beautiful enough for the gods to dwell there, and named them "Mount Olympus" after the one in Greece. Alternate proposals never caught on, and in 1864 the Seattle Weekly Gazette persuaded the government to make the present-day name official. Though readily visible from most parts of western Washington, the interior was almost entirely unexplored until the 1890s. Mount Olympus itself was not ascended until 1907, one of the first successes of The Mountaineers, which had been organized in Seattle just a few years earlier. A number of the more obscure and least-accessible peaks in the range weren't ascended until the 1970s.

The Olympic Mountains in winter, as seen from the east. The Brothers is the large double peak on the left, and Mount Constance is on the right.

The climax forests consist of Sitka spruce and western hemlock. Douglas fir occurs in groves. Other types of firs may be seen also. Clearings in the forest quickly become covered with vine maple, slide alder, and devil's club, making cross-country travel most challenging.

Another consequence of the high precipitation is the large number of snowfields and glaciers, reaching down to 1,500 m (5,000 ft) above sea level.

The Mount Olympus National Monument was proclaimed by Theodore Roosevelt in 1909, and made into a park in 1938.

Principal summits:

• Mount Olympus - highest point, eight glaciers
• Mount Constance - largest peak visible from Seattle
• Mount Anderson - West Peak of Mt Anderson is the hydrographic apex of the Olympic Mountains: From this peak, rivers flow outward to the Pacific Ocean, the Strait of Juan de Fuca, and Hood Canal.
• The Brothers - double peak visible from Seattle
• Mount Deception
• Mount Angeles

Other Summits

• Boulder Mountain - Peak located in the Lake Crescent and Elwha River area
• Mount Storm King - located just to the south of Lake Crescent

Geology

The Olympic Mountains are made up of an obducted clastic wedge material and oceanic crust. They are primarily Eocene sandstones, turbidites, and basaltic oceanic crust(1).

References

(1). D.D. Alt, and D.W. Hyndman, 1984, Roadside Geology of Washington, p249-258

Further reading

• Available online through the Washington State Library's Classics in Washington History collection
• Olympic Mountain Rescue, Climber's Guide to the Olympic Mountains (Seattle: The Mountaineers, 1979)

External links

• OlympicMaps.com Interactive Map Server for the Olympic Mountains and Olympic Peninsula

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