After a long 8.5 hour drive through the most barren parts of Nevada, Trent, Tanner, Jason, and I arrived in Lone Pine, California (a town of about 2,000 close to Mount Whitney). Trent and Tanner are co-workers of mine and I have been in the same ward as Jason for over 10 years (he went to high school with Laura in Mexico, also, which is fun).
Here is the Mount Whitney cirque as seen from the Alabama Hills (next to Lone Pine). I actually took this picture the day AFTER the hike, but I'm including it first for context. Those jagged spikes atop the cliffs are called "the Needles." The actual summit is in the clouds:
We had intended to start our 21.5 mile trek at 4am (trailhead is just over 8k feet in elevation), but Tanner was feeling pretty sick to his stomach and requiring frequent bathroom stops, so he decided to stay behind. After such a long drive, we were super sad to hike without him! We got started on the trail just before 4:30. Here's the beginnings of sunrise about an hour later:
Getting brighter as the trees get thinner:
The white rock and ruddy-barked evergreens were already making for great views. Definitely felt different from hiking in Utah:
Trail was maintained gloriously well. There were always rocks in the perfect spots crossing streams or log bridges through marshy areas. Though long, the trail had a steady, consistent gain of about 600 feet/mile.
The orange-red bark of these evergreens was pretty neat (Jeffrey Pine?)!
This awesome little set of stone stairs is another example of the amazing trail maintenance. The trail was never difficult to locate—even on bare stone. There were often footholds and retaining walls mortared to the rock even in areas over 13,000 feet to make the trail as accessible as possible and keep the gradual grade:
Mirror Lake, not far past the first backpacking camp area:
That's the first glimpse of Mt Whitney and the Needles. We would've seen it the night before except we arrived after dark and started down the trail before sunrise:
It's called Wotan's throne:
Thor Peak. Impressive, but still 2,200 feet shorter than Mount Whitney:
Trent:
Jason:
Lone Pine Creek was fed by numerous streams like this one. The water and resulting greenery appeared to spring right out of the stone:
No trees left as we ascend above 12,000 feet and approach Trail Camp (the last camping spot before ascending up to the ridge of Mount Whitney):
A more desolate, but still stunning view:
Consultation Lake:
These are the Needles, but you can't actually see Mt. Whitney summit from here—it's further to the right:
Taking a break at Trail Camp—food and hydration help with the altitude:
Trying to get all three of us:
Starting up the "99 Switchbacks." It's in quotes because apparently there are only 97. The switchbacks do feel like they go on forever, but it's more of that trail-shaping magic that keeps things at that gradual, manageable grade the whole way:
Life! Even on those rocky switchbacks:
Halfway there:
Trail Camp Tarn on the left and Consultation Lake on the right. You can see Thor Peak on the left and that we've now climbed higher than it:
View down the early switchbacks:
View across the Whitney cirque. Finally a view of the summit peeking above the Needles:
The final switchback (the women on the left were the ones to deliver the happy news):
Whitney summit is actually fairly round/flat on the top even if there is a dramatic cliff on its East side. You can see it here. In the full resolution version you can even see the summit hut on the top:
Trail Crest, or the top of the Whitney ridge. 13,600 feet—only 900 feet left to climb and just over 2 miles to go:
The ridge brought brand new views while traversing the back of the Whitney cirque. Upper and Lower Hitchcock lakes with Mt. Hitchcock rising behind them:
Some helpful ladies took this picture for us:
Beginning the journey across the back of Whitney:
More unexpected growth:
Front (left) and back (right) of the Whitney ridge:
In the right middle ground, you can see the switchbacks snaking their way up to Trail Crest:
One of the views between the Needles:
Clouds were cruising all around us—this one stuck around for about a mile:
An ominous drop to an unseeable bottom:
Pic by Jason of me taking the following picture (or one very much like it):
I really took like a hundred pictures of Mt. Hitchcock. The lighting kept changing which kept it more than interesting to look at/photograph:
Here you can see how much less imposing the back of the Whitney ridge is. The sharp cliffs on the East-facing side are nothing like the boulder slopes that ease down to the West. Again, thanks to such excellent trail maintenance, the path was never difficult to find and never required scrambling over boulders (here's looking at you 8 out of 10 summits in Utah):
The view into the Sierra Nevadas. Being so accustomed to the look of the Rockies, these seemed so refreshingly different:
Summit (14,505 feet)! There's a closed medical station on the left for emergency medical use. The right is a storm shelter (though it's debated by many as to whether it would be any safer in the event of lightning). Luckily we had a sky free of thunder and lightning and only occasional and brief mistings of rain:
Summit register:
Inside the storm shelter:
Plaque from 1930 when Whitney was still the tallest mountain in the United States. Adding Alaska as a state in 1955 ruined that claim. Also, satellite measurements gave Mt. Whitney another 10 feet of height. It's amazing they could be so accurate without satellite measurements:
Someone not in our party enjoying the view between the clouds:
Looking down the line of cliffs/Needles on Mt Whitney cirque:
Lighting was shifting second-by-second, with walls of cloud shooting up the cliff wall in front of us:
Woo hoo!
The dude on the right lost his pack at the trailhead (bear? Stolen? No one knows). We thought he'd bailed on hiking as a result, but he had a gallon jug of water in his car and decided to go for it. He said a guy gave him jerky, but he oddly declined the snacks we offered him. He said that he went for it even packless because his permit was for that one day and he wasn't going to miss it:
More of Hitchcock and the Sierra Nevadas on the way down:
Can you make out the trail cutting horizontally through these cliffs?
So stark and stunning:
We got to the top of the switchbacks and who were we shocked to find? Tanner, sitting on a boulder! He had gone back to the hotel and slept for a couple of hours and then was feeling better so he decided to try to catch us on the trail (if he had been healthy, he definitely would have been the most capable of all of us, so that's not a crazy thought even though he started two hours later than us).
He said he had just started to panic a little upon reaching the top of the switchbacks thinking that we had somehow passed each other on the trail. After the uneasy stomach he was feeling pretty wiped out so he did not continue to the summit and turned back at Trail Crest (Still! 17 miles, 13,600 ft in elevation, and 5500 feet of climbing after being sick all morning). Here's Tanner at Trail Crest:
Finished descending the switchbacks:
The only group shot (I balanced the camera on a boulder and used that infamous 10-second timer):
A light mist of rain as we circle back by Mirror Lake:
Back in the Jeffrey Pines (and maybe some Lodgepole Pines?):
The last shot:
We went straight to the Mount Whitney Restaurant in Lone Pine and got hamburgers. Everyone, except Tanner, that is. He didn't want to risk it after the previous night and stuck to some fruit. The next morning, we enjoyed the hotel breakfast, grabbed some telephoto shots of Whitney peak from the Alabama Hills (the first picture at the beginning) and made the 8.5 hour drive back home. A memorable trip, to be sure!
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