Majestic landmarks

The most common geographical features in Salt Lake County are the Wasatch Mountains on the east side of the valley.

Rising sharply 7,000 feet above the valley floor, the Wasatch Mountains create natural landmarks in Salt Lake County. (The Oquirrh Mountains dominate the west side of the valley.)

Deseret News graphicNorthern Wasatch panoramaRequires Adobe Acrobat.

We take these mountains for granted, and while we may enjoy their inspiring, majestic beauty, their place as natural directional landmarks may not be appreciated until we visit a region that is flat.

"When I drive through Kansas or Nebraska, I wonder how people know where they're going" Dale J. Green, 71, a past president of the Wasatch Mountain Club, said.

Green started hiking the Wasatch Mountains in 1953 and believes he may have hiked almost every trail in Salt Lake County. He said his favorite peak is the "Pfeifferhorn," not visible from most of the Salt Lake Valley but located between American Fork Twin Peaks and Lone Peak on the south side of Little Cottonwood Canyon.

Charles L. Keller is another longtime Salt Lake hiker who is just finishing a book on the Wasatch Mountains, "The Lady in the Ore Bucket."

"They're my church," Keller said of the Wasatch Mountains. "I've spent the last 40 years trampling over them."

He especially loves Little and Big Cottonwood canyons and Mill Creek Canyon. His favorite hike is up Kessler Peak.

"It's steep, and there's no easy way up," he said.

Keller agrees it is too easy for Salt Lakers to take these mountains for granted.

These mountains are home to many animals, offer year-round recreational activities and are important watersheds — a critical factor each year.

The Wasatch Mountains are also the reason we have substantial water in the Salt Lake area.

"They're the main source of water for Salt Lake," said Brian McInerney, a hydrologist with the Salt Lake office of the National Weather Service.

Without the mountains, the storms would just keep moving by without raining or snowing here, and there would be neither the snowpack to fill the reservoirs nor the recharging of groundwater supplies.

Deseret News graphicSouthern Wasatch panoramaRequires Adobe Acrobat.

McInerney said mountains substantially change how air circulates in an area.