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Whitney Pictures
Yes, thats right, the tallest peak in the Continental US!
It reaches 14,505 ft.
Location: Inyo National Forest.
The summit is the beginning of the south end of the John Muir Trail and part of the Pacific Crest Trail.
The trail head for both hikes starts at the Whitney Portal, elevation 8,360ft. The trail is over 7,000ft elev. change from start to finish.
-- The Whitney Trail; most commonly traveled, it is an 11 mile hike one way. Almost the whole trail is switch backs, but the most infamous part is called "99 switchbacks" which is entirely on shale.
-- The Mountaineers Route; for the more adventurous hiker, a 6.9 mile trek one way. In the first portion of the route is the "Ebersbacher Ledges", (class 3) a tricky traverse across a cliff face. The last ascent, starting at Ice Burg Lake there is a 1,500 foot climb up a steep, loose gully of scree; the "notch", a 500 foot (class 4) technical free climb.
For those who don't know, climbing has a rating system for difficulty.
Class 1 is easier,
class 3-4 is large rock scrambling, but when you get to
class 5 it requires ropes.
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Wednesday, June 20th we drove down the 395 south of Bishop to the town of Lone Pine and drove up to the Whitney Portal campground to meet up with our group and stay the night. Tim's cousin Thomas and his friend Neil both put their names in for the lottery to get hiking permits. Yes, same as the process for getting Half Dome permits. Fortunately, both their names were picked and we got a "day use" permit for both trails.
Thursday morning we woke at 4:30am and got on the trail by 5. A mile up the trail the Mountaineer's Route branches off and that where our group split up. Five people took the Whitney Trail. Me, Tim, Neil and Thomas's other friend Eddie took the M. Route.
Have in mind, we know a lot of people face elev. sickness, so we were prepared with Aspirin and lots of water and iodine tablets if we needed more water from one of the lakes. Shot Blocks, Cliff Bars, bananas, other fruit, trail mix, peanut butter sandwiches and everything else we figured we would need to keep ourselves happy and healthy for the whole hike.
Most people do Whitney in at least 2 days, camping along the trail to break up the hike. Our group went up and back in one day. People were shocked when we told them before what we were planning to do, but we did it all the same.
With the morning sun coming up, the trail was beautiful! Quite a climb every step of the way. Took the occasional water breaks to keep hydrated and catch our breaths. Hour breakfast stop at the first lake we came to, Lower Boy Scout Lake.
Continued the constant climb past other lakes, taking more stops as needed. Came up to Ice Burg lake where we took our Lunch Break. Two hours of sitting enjoying our surroundings and recharging before our final ascent.
Like the description at the top, the last 2,000ft were intense! It took 2 hours for me to make it up the 1500ft of scree, Tim being the loving and caring man he is, stayed with the the whole way making use I made it and assisted me when parts got really tough. I am an adventurous person and really enjoyed the challenge, but made sure I was confident in every step I took. Boy was it a challenge. We took another little break, then went up the "Notch". Holy Moly! Class4... I think I would call that a 4.5, crazy! If I had rope and a harness, I would have flown up that thing, but my only safety net was Tim and his encouraging words.
AWWWWHHHHH we made it!
The people from our group that took the Whitney Trail were at the top waiting for us. A few of them were really feeling the elevation and not doing so well. They beat us to the top because they took far less breaks then us and certainly were feeling it. They waited for us because we wanted to reconnect before the trip back and we wanted a group picture. Once we did, they were in a hurry to get down. Our M. Route group hung out for a little while longer enjoying the views and the fact we made it.
Tim and I ended up traveling down by ourselves. We traveled at different speeds, Tim and I wanted to get back down as fast as we could, tired and ready to get back to camp. 99 Switchbacks were awful, they just kept going and going, and that was only the first leg of it. Every time we thought we were getting closer there was another turn, another valley. Eleven miles down felt soooo much longer. The surroundings were beautiful, but it was hard to pay attention to.
Eight 'o clock in the evening, finally back and were all celebrating! What a day. I can see why very few people do it in one day. Eighteen miles for Neil, Eddie, Tim and Me. Twenty-two miles for the others.
Friday was a chill day, four people of our group left back to home. Neil, Thomas, Eddie, Tim and I hung out for a while at the campground. There is this incredible rock with a fisher going right through it and an anchor at the top. Set up the ropes and the guys started climbing. I took the pictures. They climbed a few more boulders around the campground before we headed out.
We went up to Bishop, to a place called the Buttermilks. It is in National lands, open lands? the government owns it. There are farmers that let cattle roam free. Driving over the cattle guards, we entered into one of the most world renowned bouldering sites. Set up camp, cooked dinner over an open fire watching the sun set in those amazing surroundings. After dinner, grabbed our climbing shoes and the crash pads and headed out to do some bouldering.
Saturday Eddie, Tim and I packed up and headed home. Neil and Thomas stayed till Sunday to continue climbing.
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And that was our Whitney trip :)
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