Black Hills (Riverside County)

Butterfield Valley is a valley along the course of Temecula Creek, in Riverside County, California. Its lower end is now filled by Vail Lake. It heads at 33°27′39″N 116°55′34″W and its mouth is at the site of the Vail Lake Dam at the head of the deep canyon Temecula Creek has cut through Oak Mountain to the Pauba Valley.

Vail Lake is a large reservoir in western Riverside County, southern California.

Wilson Creek is a tributary stream of Temecula Creek, itself a tributary of the Santa Margarita River, in Riverside County, California. Its mouth is at its confluence with the reservoir of Vail Lake on Temecula Creek at an elevation of 1,460 feet (450 m). Its source is located on the south slope of Little Cahuilla Mountain at 33°36′21″N 116°48′44″W, at an elevation of 4,880 feet (1,490 m). It descends south and southwest into Reed Valley, then to its confluence with Cahuilla Creek at the head of Wilson Valley. There it turns to flow westward through Wilson Valley and Lancaster Valley to its confluence with Vail Lake.

The Tucalota Hills are a low mountain range of the Peninsular Ranges System, in Riverside County, California.

The Temecula Valley AVA is an American Viticultural Area in the Temecula Valley, located in southwestern Riverside County, California.

Rancho Pauba was a 26,598-acre (107.64 km2) Mexican land grant in present-day Riverside County, California given in 1844 by Governor Manuel Micheltorena to Vicente Moraga and Luis Arenas. The grant was just east of present-day Temecula. At the time of the US patent, Rancho Pauba was a part of San Diego County. Riverside County was created by the California Legislature in 1893 by taking land from both San Bernardino and San Diego Counties.

Radec is a small unincorporated community in Riverside County, California, United States. Located roughly 15 miles east by southeast of the city of Temecula, the community of Radec ('Cedar' spelled backwards) is located along Highway 79. Having bought land in the area in 1883, early settler Samuel Tripp set up a post office there. As of 1893–4, a local directory listed the area as growing honey, hay and stock, but also as having "no commercial interest of any kind." A total of 14 people, mainly farmers and beekeepers, plus a laborer and Tripp, are listed in the directory. The County of Riverside owns a small, non-operational cemetery in Radec.

Skinner Reservoir, also known as Lake Skinner, is a reservoir in western Riverside County, California, located at the foot of Bachelor Mountain in the Auld Valley, approximately 10 miles (16 km) northeast of Temecula. It was created in 1973 by the construction of the Skinner Clearwell Dam (expanded 1991) on Tucalota Creek, and currently has a capacity of 44,200 acre-feet (54,500,000 m3). Located north of Rancho California Road near the Temecula Valley Wine Country, The address of the reservoir is: 37701 Warren Road, Temecula, CA 92592. Lake Skinner is operated by the Riverside County Regional Park and Open-Space District (RivCo Parks), under lease by the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California. It is supplied by the Colorado River Aqueduct and the State Water Project, and feeds the Robert A. Skinner filtration plant, which provides treated water to 2.5 million people in Riverside and San Diego Counties. It is named after Robert A. Skinner, general manager of the Metropolitan Water District from 1962 to 1967, who was instrumental in negotiating Metropolitan's contract with the California Department of Water Resources for delivery of water from Northern California.Lake Skinner is a popular recreation area, featuring sailing, fishing, swimming (in an off-reservoir swimming area), horseback riding and hiking. The Lake Skinner recreational area includes 1,400 acres (5.7 km²) of surface water and 300 acres (1.2 km²) of lakeside parkland, features 158 RV sites and 300 developed campsites, and is the site of the annual Temecula Valley Balloon & Wine Festival and the Solar Cup competition. The reservoir was formed by construction of a dam on Tucalota Creek, along with two minor creeks named Middle Creek and Schoolhouse Creek. Tucalota Creek below the reservoir flows to Santa Gertrudis Creek, then Murrieta Creek, then to the Santa Margarita River and ultimately to the Pacific Ocean.

Agua Tibia Wilderness (ATW) is a 17,961-acre (72.69 km2) protected area in Riverside and San Diego counties, in the U.S. state of California. It is mostly within the Palomar Ranger District of the Cleveland National Forest. The area was originally protected as the Agua Tibia Primitive Area until January 1975 when it was added to the National Wilderness Preservation System with the passage of Public Law 93-632 by the United States Congress. Between its inception and 1984, the ATW was San Diego County's only officially designated wilderness area. The Spanish name, Agua Tibia, translates as warm water. Its approximate boundaries are: North – SR 79 East – Arroyo Seco River South – Fray Creek West – Pala Road

Cahuilla Creek is a tributary stream of Wilson Creek which is in turn a tributary of Temecula Creek, and the Santa Margarita River in Riverside County, California. Its mouth is at its confluence with Wilson Creek at an elevation of 2,106 feet (642 m). Its source is at 33°36′40″N 116°40′10″W, at an elevation of 5,800 feet, on the west slope of Thomas Mountain 0.6 miles west-southwest of Tool Box Spring. It flows southwest through the Anza Valley and Cahuilla Valley in the Cahuilla Indian Reservation to Wilson Creek, 7 miles south-southwest of Cahuilla Mountain and 20 miles south-southeast of San Jacinto.

The Pechanga Band of Luiseño Mission Indians is a federally recognized tribe of Luiseño Indians based in Riverside County, California, where their reservation is located. As of 2006, there were 1,370 members of the nation. The tribe owns the Pechanga Resort & Casino in Temecula and the naming rights to the San Diego sports arena now known as the Pechanga Arena. There are five other federally recognized tribes of Luiseño bands based in southern California, and an organized band that has not received federal recognition as a tribe. Riverside county documents sometimes have the revived Pechanga language, despite the tribe is often monolingual in English and during Mexican rule of the region (1821-1848), they were Spanish dominant in language.

The Temecula massacre took place in December 1846 east of present-day Temecula, California, United States. It was part of a series of related events in the Mexican–American War. A combined force of California militia and Cahuilla Indians attacked and killed an estimated 33 to 40 Luiseño Indians. The Mexicans took the military action in retaliation for the Indians' killing 11 Californio lancers, in what was called the Pauma Massacre.