Four years ago I attempted a two day trip up Mt. Whitney and did not make it due to bad weather. Three years ago I was lucky enough to summit Mt. Whitney during another two day trip due to perfect conditions. This year my friend's and I decided to hike Mt. Whitney in one day. Three out of six of us made it - I was not one of the three that summited. Why? Just a little too much snow and ice at the "cable" section of the 99 switchbacks caused me to turn around.
I had started thinking about hiking Mt. Whitney in one day some time last year. After summiting three years ago I told myself that I didn't need to do it again. But I got the Whitney fever (as apposed to the actual fever I got two days after hiking this year.) There were several reasons I wanted to hike Whitney again. Last time I, and everyone else, had a great time. Training for the hike is a great way to get into physical shape, and I was starting to get overweight, especially in my stomach area. Also, I liked the idea of not having to carry a full backpack up to Trail Camp. However, I knew that trying to hike 22 miles in one day with a 6000 foot elevation gain, with no time to acclimate was going to be extremely challenging.
So my friend Steve requested six permits in the lottery for a day hike on three possible dates in late June or early July. We were selected for July 2nd. So starting around April we began our training, which consisted of day hikes in San Diego. The two main hikes were Iron Mountain in Poway, a six mile round trip hike that can be done in two hours. This is a good after-work hike. The other hike was up Mt. Woodson in Poway. This hike was good to do early Saturday morning. If you hike from the Blue Sky Reserver, it is about 10 miles round trip with a 2350 foot elevation gain. Our only major warm-up hike was San Gorgonio, which is a major hike all by itself. Although we did not summit, it was still a good work-out and let us know what shape we were in for Whitney.
As the date approached, I read the trip reports on the Whitney Portal Message Board daily. This was a heavy snow year, so my main concern was too much snow, mainly on the switchbacks. We were not prepared to hike in the snow, so I was hoping for a fast snow melt. It looked like the only section that might be an issue was at the cable section of the 99 switchbacks. There was still quite a bit of snow, but people were starting to make a path over the snow and most were making it without special equipment.
On July 1st the time had come to drive to lone pine. Of the six original hikers, two had decided not to go for various reasons, but we had no problem finding other's who wanted to join our adventure - kind of. Of the six, four had hiked and summited Whitney at least once. For the other two, it was their first time, and also their first time going on a major hike. We arrived in Lone Pine in the early afternoon and checked in to the Dow Villa, our usual hotel. We had time to drive up to Whitney Portal in an attempt to get some acclimation to high altitude and to talk to hikers about the conditions on the trail. Everyone we talked to said that they had no problem at the cable section, so that was reassuring.
Our plan was to get an early start the next. We had a disagreement as to when we needed to wake up in order to start our hiking early enough. We finally decided on meeting for breakfast at 1:15 AM and start hiking by 2:30. We ate dinner at Seasons at 5 PM, where I had a huge pasta meal. After that we all turned in to try to get some sleep. Now I knew it was not going to be easy going to bed before eight, getting good sleep, and waking up at 12:45 AM. That is just not normal, not something the body and mind are used to. I tried to sleep, but tossed and turned and maybe fell asleep around 10, but woke up every 30 minutes. When the alarm went off it felt like I never got any sleep.
Looking back, it was a mistake to have a good breakfast at the local 24 hour diner. There was only one employee working, so it took more than 30 minutes to order, eat and pay the bill. We should have just eaten in our room and left for the hike. Now we know. So in our cars we went and drove to Whitney Portal. We arrived just after 3 AM and there were quite a few other hikers in the parking lot getting ready too. We put on our headlamps, had a group photo taken, and even weighed our packs. Mine was 17 pounds, much less than the 35 pounds last time. We officially began our hike at 3:20 AM.
The one thing we did not practice was hiking in the dark, so I was a little worried that it would be difficult. However, even after just 30 minutes of hiking, I got used to it. In fact, it was kind of fun! The trail up to Lone Pine Lake is very easy to follow, and this was the 5th time I've hiked this stretch. The only difficult part was the first stream crossing. The water was flowing pretty good over the rocks, so we had to go slow, use our hiking poles, and light up the way for the others. There was a half Moon out, but it did not provide enough light to help see, but did provide a cool night view of the sky.
We made very good time, thanks to Steve leading the way, who was determined to keep on his planned schedule. It took us two hours to get to Outpost Camp. By that time, is was light enough to put our lights away. I was amazed that you could see the sun starting to rise at 4:30 - I guess that was the crack of dawn. We walked through Outpost Camp, past people still sleeping, some just steps off the trail for some reason. From there the trail gets steeper, but we kept going, taking food and rest breaks as needed. Also, we made sure to take time to take photos, especially around sunrise, when the forest and mountains were glowing orange.
At 7:30 we arrived at Trail Camp. I was still surprised how quickly we got there. I had never hike straight to Trail Camp without stopping at Lone Pine Lake. Once there we filtered water, ate more food, and put on sunscreen. By 8:00 we were ready to tackle the switchbacks. Up until now, there were small patches of snow that were not too difficult to cross. On one I did slip and fall and almost hit Paula, but I was able to stop in time. The path to the switchbacks had some snow, but it was still an easy walk. Once on the switchbacks, there was running water, some ice, and as you got higher there was snow that most hikers avoided by cutting up to the next switchback.
At this point the six of us were spread out, with Steve once again leading the way. I was taking my time and drinking plenty of water to keep from getting a headache or altitude sickness. For the first time I took prescription medication to help with altitude sickness. My doctor prescribed Dexamethasone, a medication that shrinks your brain, thus keeping it from expanding in your cranium. Most people seem to use Diamox, but I had to use what my doctor gave me. I had two 4mg pills, one I took the morning before, and one the morning of the hike. I'll never know if it helped, however, I did not get altitude sickness, but then had I summited, who knows.
So after about an hour or more of hiking we reached the cable section of the switchbacks. Once there I decided to see how for I could go. People were crossing the high snow section without any problems. I hiked across the first part which wasn't so bad. But the last part didn't look too safe. The path was just wide enough for one boot, but what worried me was what if my right food slipped. I'd fall 500 feet down and then slide another 500 feet on snow and rocks. I realized early that I need new boots. The traction on my boots was not that good. So even with hiking poles, I decided not to continue. It was beyond my comfort level, and they say you should never go beyond your comport level when hiking. Plus, I was worried about the conditions on the way back if the snow got more icy. I felt bad, because I wasn't tired, didn't have a headache, and my hiking partners all made it. But I had made up my mind, and told them to have fun and I'd be waiting for them back at Trail Camp.
As I hiked back down I encountered many groups still hiking up. They all wanted to know how the trail was, so I told them all why I turned around, wished them good luck and continued on. I found out later that almost all of the hikers I talked to made it past the cable section. It took very little time for me to hike back to Trail Camp, even with the detours to avoid the snowy sections. Once at Trail Camp, I realized I might have a long wait before my friends returned. I began by re-filtering my water. Somehow I ended up with lots of soot in my water and it did not taste good. So I dumped my water out and filtered some new, fresh water. Then, because I was told it felt good, I took off my shoes and socks and put my feet in the water. This is supposed to reduce the swelling of the feet from all the pounding they take while hiking, and I'm sure it did, but the water was so cold my feet went numb and I could only keep them under water for 20 seconds at a time.
Once I dried my feet and got my socks and boot back on I began to kill time. I wanted to make the most of this time, so a walked around for a while, took some more pictures, as it was still perfectly sunny outside. In fact, I had not seen one cloud since arriving at Lone Pine. However, after an hour I found a comfortable rock to sit on that was near the trial and in the shade. I spent the next few hours resting, eating and talking to hikers as they passed by. Some hikers ignored me, thinking I was strange just sitting there on a rock doing nothing. While sitting there, one man came running by on the way up, and within two hours he came running back down. Turns out he made it to the summit in under three hours. That is amazing.
I wasn't sure how long I'd have to wait. I kept looking up the switchbacks for a group of five hiking down, but group after group came hiking by and none of them were my friends. Finally, around 3:30, Lee came walking by. I was expecting the whole group, but he explained that he and Darin didn't summit, but were waiting for the other three that were headed to the summit. Lee decide he had waited long enough and came down. Since he had told Darin that if he found me then he'd hike down to the Portal. I was ready to hike and tired of waiting, so we left Trail Camp and headed down.
Even though you hike faster on the way down, it always seems to take longer. There were many stretches of the trial that I just didn't remember hiking up, partly due to being so tired, perhaps. Along the way we both passed people we had seen earlier in the day, and most had summited. Our goal was to get down before dark, even though we still had our lights. I still took time to stop to take a few photos, as the sun was at a different angle providing for new photo opportunities. We actually did make it back to the trail head by 7:30. Once again I must say it was nice making this hike with a day-pack. Last time, with a full pack, I was walking at a 1/2 mile/hour and my knees were killing me. This time my knees barley hurt and I kept up a good pace.
Luckily I was one of the two drivers, and the other drive, who was still somewhere on the mountain, had a car that could also hold four people. So Lee and I drove back to the hotel. After I took a nice warm, long shower, it was time to wait. I knew if I laid down in bed I'd fall asleep, and I had to stay awake in case I needed to go back up the hill to get my friends. Plus, we had planned for pizza and beer, and after two weeks of no beer I was ready for a tall, cool one.
Well, around 9PM I began to worry. I knew two of the four were experienced hikers, and everyone had food, water and clothing for the cold, but anything can happen on Whitney. Then, after a strange sequence of phone calls, I found out that three had summited at 2PM, and two in the group were at the Portal and the other two were about 45 minutes behind. They turned out to be an hour behind at arrived back to their car at 10:30 and the hotel at 11:00. Everyone was safe, hungry and tired. It was too late for pizza as the Pizza Factory was closed, so we were forced to eat at the High Sierra Cafe again, and once again, the same woman was the only one working. We were working on being awake for 24 hours but needed some food before going to sleep. I'm not sure if I needed a bacon cheeseburger just before bedtime, but it tasted good. The beer would have to wait.
Everyone slept well and we were up by 9 AM. For breakfast we ended up at Mt. Whitney Restaurant, which may or may not have been the source of the possible food poisoning that two of us got (and I still have). After breakfast we drove home and got back to San Diego by the early evening. Once home and unpacked I finally had the well-deserved beer - or two. I had no real plans for the 4th, but even if I did I started feeling sick Sunday morning and ended up in bed with a temperature of 101.5 and feeling like crap. Maybe it is a curse, but this is the third time hiking Whitney and the third time I've gotten very sick afterwards.
No matter, I believe the hike was worth it. I had fun before, during and after the hiking. I joke that they should sell a shirt that says "I almost climbed Whitney in a Day", because I would have bought it. Do I want to try hiking Whitney in a day again? No. Do I want to hike it in an overnight trip again? Yes.
