page_title: Rampart Ridge (Washington)
section_title: Geology
hierarchical_section_title: Rampart Ridge (Washington) / Geology
caption_attribution_description: English: Lila Lake on Rampart Ridge, Hibox Mountain (6547 ft) on Box Ridge, Mountain Hemlock, Kachess Ridge (right skyline); stitched panorama of 525, 526 and 527
context_page_description: Rampart Ridge is a 5,870 ft elevation mountain ridge located in the Cascade Range, in Kittitas County of Washington state. It is situated northeast of Hyak, Washington, and the north end of Keechelus Lake, within the Alpine Lakes Wilderness, on land managed by Wenatchee National Forest. Its nearest higher peak is Alta Mountain, 1.74 mi to the north-northeast, and Dungeon Peak rises 0.77 mi to the south-southwest. The north-south trending ridge is characterized by vertical cliffs on its west-facing side above the Gold Creek valley, and gentle meadows with lakes on the eastern side, such as Rachel Lake, Lake Lillian, and the Rampart Lakes. The descriptive name of rampart was officially adopted 1918 by the United States Board on Geographic Names based on a suggestion by The Mountaineers. Precipitation runoff from the ridge drains into tributaries of the Yakima River.
context_section_description: The Alpine Lakes Wilderness features some of the most rugged topography in the Cascade Range with craggy peaks and ridges, deep glacial valleys, and granite walls spotted with over 700 mountain lakes.  Geological events occurring many years ago created the diverse topography and drastic elevation changes over the Cascade Range leading to the various climate differences.  These climate differences lead to vegetation variety defining the ecoregions in this area.
  The history of the formation of the Cascade Mountains dates back millions of years ago to the late Eocene Epoch. With the North American Plate overriding the Pacific Plate, episodes of volcanic igneous activity persisted.  In addition, small fragments of the oceanic and continental lithosphere called terranes created the North Cascades about 50 million years ago.
  During the Pleistocene period dating back over two million years ago, glaciation advancing and retreating repeatedly scoured the landscape leaving  deposits of rock debris. The last glacial retreat in the Alpine Lakes area began about 14,000 years ago and was north of the Canada–US border by 10,000 years ago. The "U"-shaped cross section of the river valleys are a result of that recent glaciation. Uplift and faulting in combination with glaciation have been the dominant processes which have created the tall peaks and deep valleys of the Alpine Lakes Wilderness area.
caption: Lila Lake on Rampart Ridge. Hibox Mountain to left
exif: {"Image ImageWidth": "3341", "Image ImageLength": "1734", "Image BitsPerSample": "[8, 8, 8]", "Image PhotometricInterpretation": "2", "Image Make": "Panasonic", "Image Model": "DMC-FZ5", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image SamplesPerPixel": "3", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop Elements 11.0 Macintosh", "Image DateTime": "2013:09:05 17:16:33", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Centered", "Image ExifOffset": "308", "GPS GPSVersionID": "[2, 2, 0, 0]", "GPS GPSLatitudeRef": "N", "GPS GPSLatitude": "[47, 25, 34383/625]", "GPS GPSLongitudeRef": "W", "GPS GPSLongitude": "[121, 19, 993/25]", "GPS GPSAltitudeRef": "0", "GPS GPSAltitude": "729407/447", "Image GPSInfo": "524", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "766", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "9639", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0230", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2007:09:26 15:03:47", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2007:09:26 15:03:47", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "3076", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "1731"}