May 19, 2021
- Start: Trail Camp (Mile 6.5)
- End: Whitney Portal (Mile 22)
- Distance: 15.5 miles total
I had a horrible night’s sleep last night up at Trail Camp. Truth be told, I probably only got a sum total of three hours of sleep, most of which was in 10-15 minute bursts.
Each time I woke up, I found myself worried that my Mt. Whitney summit bid wasn’t going to be a reality. It was that horrible combination of: (1) a dull headache from the high altitude, and (2) waves of nausea crashing over me. I know what mild altitude sickness feels like and, unfortunately, THIS was definitely it.
The gusty wind up at 12,000 feet was also keeping me from getting any sleep. The air was whipping around enough that one side of my rainfly tore loose around 2 am. As I crawled out to re-secure it in the ground and put some rocks on it, I felt like kicking myself once again about needlessly driving up to 11,000 feet twice yesterday.
That rapid ascent and descent might not be the actual root behind this debilitating feeling. But I wanted to blame it on something external rather than my own body’s weaknesses. Each time I woke, I kept sipping water in an effort to hydrate and desperately hoped it would help my symptoms subside.
After readjusting my tent fly at 2 am, I found myself wide awake for the next hour for absolutely no reason. I tried my best to fall back asleep using all my normal tricks, but the more I thought about sleep, the more it seem to elude me. Dammit. This was another high-altitude side effect.
With little hope that I’d ever fall asleep naturally, I went for the my old stand by. I dug out my earbuds, plugged them into my phone and scrolled through my podcasts for something to distract and relax me. As luck would have it, I still had an episode or Revisionist History downloaded on my phone. Perfect!
Malcolm Gladwell’s slow cadence and soothing voice almost always does the trick. It’s the reason I can’t listen to him narrate anything while I’m driving. He could be reading the most riveting book ever or something totally banal (like a take-out menu), and it puts me in a soft, relaxed trance. His voice instantly tranquilizes my subconscious.
Sure enough – in a matter of minutes, I found myself drifting off into a shallow sleep.
By 3:30 am, I started to hear voices and feet shuffling nearby on the dirt trail that wound past my tent. I don’t know if these were some of the hikers who’d departed Whitney Portal just after midnight to maximize their 24-hour permit. Or it could have been some of my fellow Trail Camp cohorts hoping to get to the summit for sunrise. Either way, it pulled me out of my sleep.
As I lay there trying to eke out a few more minutes of rest before my 5 am alarm, I took stock of my current condition. The altitude sickness I’d been feeling earlier seemed to be wearing off. I no longer had a headache. The nauseated feeling had subsided. I still had no appetite, but that was par for the course.
It certainly wasn’t the restful night that I was hoping for before today’s big hike. But at least I no longer felt I might have to consider abandoning my push for the summit entirely.
As the number of voices around me continued to increase, I peeked outside my tent to see the sun cresting the horizon in the most spectacular fashion. The sky was orange and pink, and a purple hue seemed to settle over the entire area.
My first order of business this morning wasn’t just admiring the views though. I still needed to head down to the small mountain lake beside to filter a few liters of cold alpine water for the day’s hike.
I’d been too tired (and cold) to do it when I got to camp last night, and now I didn’t have a choice. I was down to my final few sips of water. Boiling some water for a giant cup of coffee would surely perk me up.
I bundled up and made my way to the small tarn to gather water and realized the morning temperature dropped down near 20°F overnight! It’s hard to believe I’d worried about being too hot while hiking yesterday! Or that I’d hiked up all the way up here in shorts! Mother Nature was definitely reminding me that it was still mid-May in the Sierras!
With my 2-liter water bladder filled with fresh lake water, I jumped back in my tent to find my water filter. It was still buried deep inside my quilt so my body warmth would protect it from the cold overnight. This was the first hike of the season and I hadn’t wanted my filter to freeze.
But then my heart sank. Despite my best efforts, my filter wasn’t working! I screwed it onto the bladder and tried to squeeze the water into my empty water bottle, but nothing was happening. No matter how hard I pressed, the water wasn’t going through the filter. All I got was 4-5 drops. Dammit, my filter was kaput!
Maybe the silt from my hike on the Achenbach Trail destroyed it. I thought I’d backlashed the filter well enough, but I guess not!
Unfortunately, I didn’t have any purification tablets for this super short hike. So I’d backed myself into just two remaining options here: (1) I could boil all the water I’d need for the next 12 hours of hiking, or (2) I could risk drinking untreated water.
Neither option was a good one. It would take me FOREVER to boil 2-3 liters of water in my tiny 0.5L pot at this altitude. And then I’d have to let each pot cool before I could transfer it to my plastic bottle and move on to the next one.
But the alternative wasn’t any better. If I drank contaminated water I could get some microscopic waterborne illness, and truthfully, I had no desire for rampant diarrhea, vomiting, or stomach pain at the end of my adventure.
Being the prudent person that I tend to be, you’d probably assume that the risk of giardia would have scared me into taking the safer option. But, it didn’t. I wanted to get hiking – and losing an hour (or more) to boiling and cooling water wasn’t going to happen.
Instead, I mentally rationalized just drinking the water. This tarn was fed from melting snow. And it was really early in the hiking season, so nobody was swimming (or bathing) in the frigid water. Plus, everyone hiking up here was using wag bags to prevent feces from running into the water.
After throwing caution to the wind, I shoved the bare minimum of items into my pack. The majority of my gear could remain behind in my tent. There was no reason to carry my tent, sleep system, bear can, cooking gear, or defunct water filter to the summit.
I’d come right past Trail Camp on my way back down, and I could wait to pack it all up then. In the meantime, I was going to slack pack with just the gear I’d need to make it to the top of Mt. Whitney.
I departed camp around 5:40 am, and even though it was mostly light out, I could still see a number of headlamps on the 99 switchbacks above me. This reminded my of the time I summited Mt. Kilimanjaro in the dark. I couldn’t see my destination (then or now), but I knew I wasn’t even remotely close if I could see all those headlamps moving above me.
Barely 10 minutes into the hike, I encountered my second hazard of the morning. All the water that had been running down the trail yesterday froze overnight. The trail now looked like it had a 1/2″ or more of pure ice covering it.
This was the moment when I was overjoyed that I’d remembered to bring my microspikes. They fit right over my trail runners, and the small metal pieces on the bottom would grip the ice and snow to help keep me upright, and
As the ice transitioned between ice and snow on the the switchbacks, I was able to maintain a respectable pace without falling on my ass once. So, while they might not be ultralight (the type of microspike I wear weigh nearly a pound), I wouldn’t have wanted to be up here in May without them!
Microspikes weren’t the only cold weather gear I’d lugged halfway up this mountain yesterday. I was super grateful to brining lots of layers. This morning I’d needed my fleece-lined LL Bean ski tights, a wool shirt, and second shirt, my raincoat, my beanie hat, and a pair of gloves. Plus, I was slackpacking even more items in my pack for when I got closer to the summit.
The first distinctive waypoint I encountered this morning was the steel cables halfway up the switchbacks. This is one of those areas that many hikers stress over. It’s an exposed ledge area where you need to watch your step, and it also tends to be one of the last places where the snow melts on the trail.
On higher snow years, this stretch of the trail can still be totally impassible in May. But, this year it wasn’t a big of a hazard. There was still some snow, for sure, but it wasn’t too difficult to traverse – especially with trekking poles and microspikes.
As I made it halfway across the narrow ledge, I turned back around and look back toward Trail Camp. I was now well above the lake and could see all the way down to the Owens Valley. A layer of orange lingered over the Inyo Mountains on the opposite side of the valley.
Even if I only made it this far, I’d have some memories worth savoring.
Once I got above the cables, I caught some of the hikers ahead of me. I was making good time and passed several people trying to catching their breath in this thin air.
Several more switchbacks up, it was my turn to stop on the side of the trail. The wind was picking up remarkably. It must be blowing at a constant 20-25 mph.
I pulled my puffy coat out of my pack and added a buff over the lower part of my face, but it was turning brutally cold up here. Even the (unfiltered) water in my bottle was icing up.
My one remaining problem was my hands though. The wind seemed to be cutting right though the thin fabric of my wool gloves. I’d activated a pair of HotHands before leaving Trail Camp and put one in each glove. Unfortunately, this was not working for me any more. My fingers hurt terribly and I was having trouble holding my trekking poles.
With limited options available at 13,000 feet, I dug out the two “emergency” plastic bags I always carry in my pack.
I always tote along a pair of long plastic bags with me – the kind your newspaper gets delivered in on rainy days. I pulled the bags over my gloves like ill-fitting mittens and tucked the excess length inside the sleeves of my puffy coat. It wasn’t pretty, but my hands would be 100% warmer without the biting wind cutting through the fabric!
With that issue resolved, I merged back into the gaggle of people dotting the trail. I was now somewhere in the middle of a 6-person group working their way toward the summit. They probably started together, but now it seemed to be “every person for themselves.” The strong hikers forged ahead, while their out-of-breath companions trailed further and further back.
I felt a surge of joy when I finally made it to top of Trail Crest. From the top of the switchbacks, nearly a half mile back, I’d been intently focused on this ridgeline. I could see the narrow dirt trail disappearing up and over the rocky rim just beyond a wooden sign. It seemed so close, but took forever to reach!
While this spot might hold the name “trail crest” I wasn’t anywhere close to Mt. Whitney’s summit. I still had nearly another 1,000 feet of vertical gain ahead of me! However, once I was over this hump, I’d be hiking on the opposite side of the 14,000′ ridgeline running between Discovery Pinnacle and Mt. Whitney.
The first thing I notices were views on the west side of the mountains. They looked radically different to my eyes. I was now entering Sequoia National Park near the southern terminus of the John Muir Trail (JMT). Snow dusted almost all the peaks. The lakes at the bottom of the valley sat covered in white ice sheets still.
Barely a hundred yards beyond Trail Crest, I reached the junction for the JMT. If I continued downhill on the west side of the mountains, I’d zigzag my way down below 11,500 toward Guitar Lake and begin the 210 mile route toward Yosemite Valley.
Or, I could continue to follow the narrow ledges toward the highest point in the state.
The trail ahead of me hugged a rocky wall and the drop off was steep enough that I spent 100% of my energy focusing on the route. The 18″ strip of dirt was more than wide enough to accommodate a hiker, but several parts were still precariously covered in snow that required careful footing.
As I moved along, I struggled to maintain my focus. My brain filled with that foggy feeling that generally comes with higher elevations. The abrupt drop down into the valleys off to my left side was starting to become vertigo-inducing.
I sharpened my attention on the horizon, then back down to the 2-3 feet of trail immediately ahead of me. I reminded myself to ignore the basin beside me and that seemed to quell the spinning sensation enough that I could progress down the trail again.
There was an unexpected bonus to hiking on the opposite side of the ridge too. The stone pinnacles above me seemed to shield me from the worst of the wind. It was still wicked cold up here, but at least the blasts of frigid air were no longer raging.
As the trailed curved around the back side of Mt. Muir, I could see Mt. Whitney’s summit almost a mile and a half ahead in the distance. I probably wouldn’t have known it was Mt. Whitney from this angle, but I could see the faint outline of the stone hut on the summit. It was soooo far away still.
For the next 45 minutes, I continued to leapfrog with different members of the 6-person group that I was stuck between. I’d pass someone who stopped to rest or eat a snack. Then they’d catch and surpass me when it was my turn to rest. Progress was slow and I lamented on how long it was taking me to inch forward.
Back home I could walk this same distance in 20 minutes with no problem. But, hiking above 13,000′ was nowhere near that easy. Add in the gradual climb and I might had well been in a foot race with a sloth. The only thing driving me forward was the notion that each step was bringing me closer to the summit.
After about a mile, I finally reached the mountainside snow field right before the final summit push. This is one of the last spots the snow melts near Whitney’s summit, and it looked surreal. Instead of the shallow dimpled sun cups hikers normally see in the Sierras, this snowfield formed sharp steeple-like peaks called penitentes, which are only found at high altitude.
This final trail segment beyond the snow field felt like the steepest bit of the hike yet. I was near 14,200 feet now and still had 300 feet more of vertical gain left. Each step was a labor, and the cold wind was fiercely picking up again as the trail took a sharp right turn.
Then dirt pack wove back and forth a bit, and time seemed to standing still. I was beginning to wonder if I was EVER going to see the end of this blasted trail.
Then, all of a sudden, I looked up and saw the metal roofline of the stone hut. In an instant, my fatigue disappeared and adrenaline course through me!
I promptly turned around toward the hiker trudging 100 feet behind me and yelled, “I see it! I can see the summit!!“
His head tilted upward from his intense focus on the ground, and his eyes met mine. He held an exhausted gaze, and it took several seconds for him to realize what I’d just shouted down to him.
Then, it was as if I could literally see his brain processing the message. His appearance went from weary to exuberant, and a smile as wide my own spread across his face. We made it!! Just a few more feet and we’d be there!!
Atop the relatively flat summit, I made my way over to the stone hut built back in 1909, and tore the bags off my gloves so I could sign my name in the register. The temperature was so brisk my fingers were numb and my hand was shaky. So who knows whether anything I wrote in that log was truly legible.
I quickly ducked inside the hut for a look, but it wasn’t exactly warm inside. A plaque was sunk into the wall cautioning hikers about the extreme danger from lightning at this elevation, and warning them that the shelter wouldn’t protect them from potential peril.
A small handprinted sign was also propped against the wall, announcing that I’d reached Fisherman’s Peak – a name that almost successfully replaced Mt. Whitney in 1881 before the California governor vetoed the legislation because he thought it was an April Fool’s joke.
The change was actually a sincere proposal from the state legislature though. It was meant to honor three local fisherman named Charley Begole, Johnny Lucas, and Al Johnson who made the peak’s first recorded summit in 1873.
There were only only a handful of people on the summit with me now, but the air was filled with excitement. Everyone was celebrating and cheering. And we took turns taking each other’s pictures atop the boulder with the Mt. Whitney sign.
Remnants of snow still clung to the boulders but I was mostly taken in by the views of the mountains and valleys around me. No piece of ground in the contiguous 48 states was higher than where I stood in that moment.
Even though the sun was out and shining brightly in the sky is was still cold as ever. Perhaps it was the biting wind. Or maybe the early hour (heck, it was still only 9:20 am). Either way, I was ready to begin my journey back down to the trailhead. I still had 11 long miles of hiking to go before this day would be done.
On my way back toward Trail Crest, I passed two ladies wearing daypacks who appeared to be close to my age. One of them looked at my hands (or, more accurately, the plastic bags I’d put back over my gloves for the return trip) and started laughing and told me, “What a clever idea!”
I was too tired to discern whether she actually meant it or thought I was a complete dork for coming up on this mountain without better gloves to protect my fingers. Truthfully, I didn’t much care.
Even though I was heading downhill, the return trip to Trail Camp seemed to take an eternity. I just wanted to get back down to my tent and belongings where I could rest.
When I finally made it back down to the cables, the snow on the rocks seemed to be dripping in massive icicles. I paused to take a photo and wondered whether I’d need my microspikes or if the trail had melted one again.
The wind had completely died down by now and I was actually starting to feel warm. The sun was directly overhead and it was like one of those sunny Colorado days where the temperature feels at least 20 degrees warmer.
As it turns out, I didn’t need my microspikes. There were still a few sketchy bits of snow covering the trail, but they were more slushy than icy now that it was nearly noon.
When finally landed at Trail Camp, I was truly beat. My head was pounding with a terrible headache again and my throat was parched. But more than anything else, I just wanted to lie down in my tent and rest before tackling the final 6.5 miles down to Whitney Portal.
As I took in my surroundings, Trail Camp looked like a ghost town. Tents were still pitched, but nobody seemed to be around. Perhaps their owners left them here (just like I had) and were somewhere above me on the mountain. Or maybe they were inside their tents resting. I was too tired to really care.
I figured I could afford to stop and rest here for the next 90 minutes before packing up, so I boiled up some lake water for lunch and crawled into my tent to lie down.
As I waited for my food to rehydrate, the sun seemed to be turning my tent into a high altitude greenhouse. Time to switch back into my shorts and sunshirt from yesterday, and I would wear that gear the rest of the trip down as the elevation loss continued to warm the air.
At 1:30 pm, I was back on the trail again. Before I’d made it a quarter mile from Trail Camp, I spotted a giant marmot the size of a raccoon was perched up on some rocks and watching me. I hurriedly tried to take his photo before the voices behind me caused him to scamper off.
Just as I was putting my camera back in my pouch, the voices were pulling up behind me. Well, what do you know. It was the two ladies I’d seen earlier on the mountain who’d commented on my “clever” gloves. Even though I’d changed clothes entirely, they still recognized me and asked if I wanted to join them for a swim down at Mirror Lake.
Um, hard pass.
It’s not that I have anything against swimming outdoors. I just don’t particularly like the submerging myself in freezing cold water. An ice bath in an alpine lake doesn’t tempt me in the slightest!
They shrugged like it was my loss and took off ahead of me with their tiny daypacks. As I watched them go, I sighed inwardly. Even if I wanted to join them I couldn’t hope to keep up. I’m laden down with all my gear and my stupid bear canister again just plodding along at a glacial pace.
The scenery for the next hour was pretty mediocre. The views of the valley heading back toward Whitney Portal don’t begin to compare when the mountain views I had while heading in the opposite direction yesterday. The rocks seemed bleached out above treeline and everything was a shade of gray or tan.
As I neared Mirror Lake, I pulled out my phone one again. I needed to take a photo for my mom. She climbed Mt. Whitney back she was in high school (in 1965) and her group camped near Mirror Lake on their first day.
Of course, camping is no longer allowed here and I suspect Mirror Lake probably looked a bit more pristine back then. Nonetheless, I figured she’d get a kick out of seeing what it looks nowadays.
The final miles after that were pretty much a blur for me. I found myself back in the shade of the trees at some point. There were more day hikers of every age and shape. Someone asked me for the distance to Lone Pine Lake. My ankles and calves were getting filthy as I kicked dust up.
I knew I was getting close to the trailhead when I could see a the outline of the parking lot through the trees. I wasn’t able to muster much mental excitement though. I was tired, dehydrated, windburned, and feeling the effects of altitude sickness even though I’d been descending the entire time.
And then, I was suddenly done. I was walking between the wooden walls of Whitney Portal where I’d weighed my pack barely 24 hours earlier. Then loading my pack into my car and pulling my shoes and socks off and swapping them out for my comfy sandals.
My Mt. Whitney adventure was over… or so I thought! I still had one more bump in the road waiting for me.
Day 2 Summary
HIGHLIGHTS
- Mt. Whitney’s summit! Despite the difficulty of the hike, it was 100% worth the effort to stand on the top of this majestic peak.
- Witnessing the sunrise views from Trail Camp and the cables were some of the prettiest parts of my day.
- The sharp-peaked penitenties on the snow field were one of those surreal and magical sights that I’d only seen one other time in my life
CHALLENGES
- A remote trail at 12,000′ elevation was probably not the best place to discover my water filter was broken. Next hike I’m definitely going to test my filter ahead of time!
- Packing insufficiently warm gloves for this hike was a rookie mistake. Thankfully I had a solution with my “emergency” bags, but I definitely should have prepared better.
- The altitude definitely kicked my butt. I wish I’d have more time to acclimate so I could have enjoyed this trip to its fullest.