Mt. Whitney

Highest point in the lower 48 states: 14,497 feet

For some reason, this is one of the few trips for which I didn't write a contemporaneous trip report.  Since I usually say something in an email I went back through my emails and looked for a report, but the best I found was the trip times: 8:45 to the top, 1:15 on top and 5:00 to get down.  So now, two years after the climb...

Carl and I drove in from Monterey two days before the climb, through the pass north of Yosemite, because the pass their was still closed.  We drove as far as we could up White Mountain (until the road was covered in snow) and spent the night there in the car, somewhere above 10,000 feet (where it was cold), to acclimatize.  We also got out the crampons and ice axes we had rented in Bishop (where it was hot) and practiced with them in the snow.  The next morning we drove to the Whitney portal where we saw a strange man occupying our campground.  It turned out to be John.  The rest of the guys arrived later that day, and we had the usual adventures associated with Trevor's boot sole falling off and Ian having destroyed his feet by trying to break in a brand new pair of full leather boots, and trying to get them some crampons and maybe axes.  The reports from other climbers was that the winds over trail crest were so high that no one had been able to summit for the past several days.

We woke up very early in the morning (2:30 or 3:00?) and drove half-mile to the trailhead (the night before I swore we would hike there, but when the time came I chickened out), but not before Carl and I sunblocked ourselves and bundled up in our warm clothes and snow gaiters.  We started up the trail in the dark, with me trying to follow the map to make sure we didn't miss any turns (although it is a trail).  We slogged up the switchbacks until sunrise, taking breaks every hour or so, and I quickly stripped off clothing and regretted not being in shorts.  Just before dawn we started to hit patches of snow on the trail that we had to climb over.  The further we went, the more snow there was, until sometime after Outpost Camp at 10,500 feet we were on snow exclusively.  By the time we reached Trail Camp at 12,000 feet I was worn out and moving slowly.  After a stop at the solar toilets I moved ahead with Ian to the base of the snow chute and began putting on my crampons.  Ian and I watched and waited for the others to catch up, but when they got their they said that Carl had decided to stop at Trail Camp.  I agonized about whether to go back to make sure he was alright, and to try to talk him into continuing, but I was weak enough at this point that I didn't think that I would be able to return to him and then turn around and head back up.  Trevor and John said that he was alright and felt like he wouldn't have a problem getting back down, so I decided to keep pressing, but I worried about him the rest of the day.

The snow chute was a steep and seemingly endless climb with crampons and ice axe.  The snow was cupped, often to several feet deep, and often you would lose half of every step to sliding snow.  I followed in the footsteps of a group ahead of me, but other than that climbed alone.  I had a splitting headache and was so out of breath I could often only take a single step before stopping to rest.  John shot to the top, and Ian and Trevor followed behind, talking and enjoying themselves.  I decided that as long as I was going up, I wouldn't stop, because it would be comparatively easy to get back down.  When I finally reached trail crest and the blast of cold wind coming over the ridge I was exhausted.  We all stopped for a rest and to put on our warm clothing, and then set off for the summit.  The trail is somewhat flat, and as long as it was I could walk steadily, but even the slightest incline would cause me to stop and rest every ten steps.  When we finally got to the final climb to the summit I was spending as much or more time stopped than moving.

On the summit I could finally rest, so I lay between the rocks and ate a Snickers bar.  There were ten or twenty people up there and a marmot crept around looking for handouts.  The hut on the summit had no door and the inside was filled, floor to ceiling with snow.  After an hour and a half of blessed rest we headed back down the trail.  As long as we were losing altitude I could keep going, but even the slightest inclines would wipe me out again.  By the time we reached trail crest John was starting to have altitude problems, so I gave him some ibuprofen.  At trail crest we had to decide whether to walk or glissade down.  Only Carl and I had ice axes, and John had hiking sticks.  For Ian and Trevor it was a wild and dangerous ride.  Because of the traffic there were individual chutes down the mountain.  All it took was sitting down in one and picking up your feet.  The ride down was so fast, cold, exciting and exhilarating that I forgot how tired I was.  It took five minutes to give up what it had taken over an hour to gain!

From Trail Camp down was uneventful, except Ian fell through a snow bridge and hurt his knee, and I ran out of water.  When we got to the portal I was very happy we had driven, because it cut the last half-mile off of the hike.  Carl was waiting in camp.

Trip Pictures

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