Editor’s note: Part of an occasional series on rivers, lakes, reservoirs, the Delta, innovations and the weather that play a key role in supplying Manteca, Ripon and Lathrop with water.Take a half mile rock scramble up to the summit of 11,570-foot Leavitt Peak along the Pacific Crest Trail heading south from Sonora Pass that is famous for its 100-mile Sierra views of glistening alpine lakes, soaring peaks and wind-swept treeless ridges coated with blankets of wild flowers in late spring and early summer. It is on the western slopes of Leavitt Peak where the foremost reach of the Stanislaus River watershed starts. Snow melt from the lofty summit eventually reaches the headwaters of the 45.7 mile Middle Fork of the Stanislaus River.