The Mountain Region Geography is useful to break land areas up into regions with common features The Mountain region in the West has mountains on the east side and mountains on the west side The land in the middle is desert Washington Oregon Montana North Dakota Minnesota Idaho South Dakota Wisconsin Wyoming Nevada Nebraska Iowa New Hampshire Vermont Maine Michigan New York Massachusetts Rhode Island Connecticut New Jersey Delaware Maryland Washington D C Pennsylvania Ohio West Virginia Virginia North Carolina South Carolina Utah Colorado Illinois Indiana California Arizona New Mexico Kansas Missouri Kentucky Oklahoma Arkansas Tennessee Texas Alabama Mississippi Georgia Louisiana Florida The lines drawn on this map are political lines They show the borders for each state’s government 4
The Half Dome located in Yosemite National Park is a challenge and adventure for hikers The region falls between the West Coast Midwest and Southwest regions States that fall in the Mountain region are Washington Oregon California Nevada Idaho Utah Montana Wyoming and Colorado 5
The Cascades The Cascades are a chain of mountains in the Northwest These ancient mountains are volcanoes The Mount St Helens volcano erupted in 1980 The blast flattened trees and homes for 230 square miles 370 square kilometers The plume of ash and steam was more than 12 miles 19 3 kilometers high Mount Baker Washington Mt St Helens Oregon Crater Lake Idaho Lassen Peak Nevada Utah California In the United States the Cascades begin with Mount Baker in Washington State This mountain range ends at Lassen Peak in Northern California The Mount St Helens eruption was the most destructive in U S history 6
When you visit the Cascades you will find miles of evergreen forest Some places are so cold that they have glaciers These giant sheets of ice form between the mountains Crater Lake in Oregon is 1,943 feet 592 kilometers deep That makes it the deepest lake in the United States It is also the ninth deepest lake in the world 7
