Trip to Whitney

Back in January, my sister called me. She asked if I would be willing to hike Mt. Whitney with her in the summer. Nonchalantly, I said, "sure." My thoughts were- it's a lottery to get a permit and we probably won't get one.

Fast forward to March when permits are released. Lo and behold, we win a permit for late June! My first step was to actually look up what Mt. Whitney is. And then I see all the articles about record snowfall in the California mountains. My brother, my sister, and a close family friend were all planning to hike together.

Over the next few months, I trained physically and mentally for the challenge ahead. With the snowfall, making it to the summit would be very difficult and with additional risks. In a regular year, late June can be a little tricky with snowfall. So in a record year, there was no doubt we would be facing extreme conditions towards the top. Typically, there are 97 switchbacks towards the top that you take. While they are physically easy, the challenge is the mental game of being so close and yet so far. However, in a snowy year, the switchbacks are not available. You can't see them with all the snow covering it. Instead, you must hike up a snow slope that is about 40 percent grade. And it's a mile or so in length. On average, it takes 2 hours to hike just that one mile. If you slip, it is a straight fall into rocks. Not exactly the best scenario. Experienced hikers recommended helmets, crampons, and ice axes (and the knowledge and experience to use them) to make it up the slope safely.

I wasn't about to spend $200 on an ice axe that I would never use again in my life. Nor did I want to train on one while on the mountain. I decided I would stop the hike at the base of the slope, roughly 6 miles of the 9-10 mile hike.

My sister, family friend, and I all flew into LA a few days before our permit date to acclimate to the elevation. My brother spent the weekend before in Las Vegas so would meet us in Lone Pine (the town by the Whitney trailhead) the day before our permit. We got to spend some time in California, enjoying the mountains and hiking around. A highlight was hiking some of the Pacific Crest Trail, which was beautiful. We stayed at a neat house up in the mountains and soaked in the cooler weather and sunshine.

Monday came and we all met in Lone Pine to go over our hike. The first two miles of the hike do not require a permit so we hiked those on Monday. That's because we would be hiking them in the dark the next morning so we wanted to see them in the daylight. The first two miles also has the most intense water crossing so it was nice to navigate that in daylight rather than at night for the first time. After our short 4 mile (up and down) hike, we went back into town, grabbed dinner, and rehashed the plans for Tuesday. Because of the amount of snow, we knew we had to start early before snow started to melt in the middle of the day. We tried to go to bed early.

Our hike day started at 2am with the goal to be on the hike by 3am. We were at the trailhead at 3am and ready to go. Navigation was a little difficult because of the snow covering the trail so much. We got turned around a few times, which added extra mileage to our hike. Seeing the sun come over the mountains though, was amazing. We kept trekking up and hit trail camp around 8am. I got to use my crampons, which was a first for me. At this point, I was content being done. My brother and sister attempted the snow slope. They made it about 1/2 mile up and turned around. The 1/2 mile took them 1.5 hours so it was rough.

On the way down, we got lost for about an hour, which was stressful. Thankfully, we found our way back to the trail. When all was said and done, we had hiked 18 miles for the day, in about 11 hours. All of us were safe and no one experienced altitude sickness. Despite not summiting, we had achieved our goals of being safe and getting down the mountain.

We drove back down to Lone Pine, found some food, and went to bed. The next day, my brother left to Las Vegas and we went back to LA. I met up with an old friend from Lake Jackson and got to have dinner with her. We visited the Pacific Ocean as well. Then we all flew out Thursday morning to go back home.

The scarier water crossing. It was about mid-calf deep in the middle of the day. But both sides are waterfalls. So a slip isn't an option.

Mirror Lake. So beautiful.

One fun part was these little snow slides all over. Going down them was much more fun than climbing up the snow.

This is at trail camp. The sign for it is buried and you can barely see the top of the sign. I'm guessing 4-5 feet of snow. The lake here was also frozen. You had to climb the snow up to the trail crest- the top ridge. Then it was still another 2 miles to the summit. You can't see the summit in this picture.

Our PCT day. We hiked over this lake. Beautiful views.