Palisade Glacier
The Palisade Glacier is located on the northeast side of the Palisades within the John Muir Wilderness in the central Sierra Nevada of California. The glacier descends from the flanks of four mountain peaks over in elevation of which North Palisade is third highest peak in the Sierra Nevada Range.
The cirque containing the Palisade Glacier has a history of thousands of years of glaciation. The modern glacier attained its last maximum extent during the Little Ice Age, between 250 and 170 years ago. It currently has an area of and the glacier is long and wide. It is located between and moves at a rate of per year, although it is also retreating. Palisade Glacier is one of the few glaciers in California that terminates in a proglacial lake dammed by its former moraine and the lake is turquoise colored from the glacial powder suspended in the water. The Big Pine Lakes below the glacier are also the same color. Another feature of the glacier is a moulin, which was formed in a drought during 1977, and a bergschrund.
