Dear Sam,
Aidan and I have been doing a good bit of exploring on our
road trip so far, and tonight we are preparing for our biggest adventure yet!
But I should probably start in the morning to fill you in on our preparation
for the day.
We began the day in Death Valley National Park (that place
is hot!). Aidan and I slept out under the stars last night without a tent,
partially because it was really windy and partially because we wanted to and we
thought that Death Valley would be a good place to do it. I was so tired though
that I fell asleep really quickly and didn’t do much stargazing… Anyway, we
woke up in the morning pretty much as soon as the sun came up, because with the
sun came the heat. Packing up was easy because we didn’t have to take down a
tent, and we had granola and powdered milk for breakfast, which was a nice
change from the usual oatmeal packets.
 |
| Good morning! |
 |
| Our camp spot |
From Death Valley we drove Highway 190 to Lone Pine,
California. We stopped at the Eastern Sierra Interagency Visitor Center to pick
up our permit to hike Mt. Whitney, the tallest mountain in the lower 48 United
States. Our plan is to hike part way up tomorrow, then camp and try to summit
the following day before heading down. The rangers at the visitor center were
super friendly and having a really good time at work, enjoying each other and
making all kinds of jokes. They happily gave us our permit and bear canister
(to store food in to keep the bears away). They told us that a storm would be
heading in tomorrow night, so we should keep that in mind. When we asked about
trail conditions, we were told that for the most part the trail was clear but
we would need an ice ax and crampons to make it over the pass. We nodded and
smiled, but secretly I was thinking “Oh no… we don’t have either of those
items.” They were all still having a light-hearted and really great time. When
I asked if we could leave our tent at our camp spot on the mountain when we
push for the summit, they joked that Mike’s job was to run up every day and
steal people’s tents to sell in the used backpacking equipment store out back.
I laughed and considered asking if they had any crampons for sale, but didn’t
want to allude to the fact that I didn’t have any.
 |
| The desert has more life than Death Valley.... |
 |
| Our first view of the Sierras! |
Aidan and I left the visitor center and had lunch near there
on some picnic tables to discuss our options. We had applied for the permit
months ago, and this is our only chance so we decided that we might as well try
it and we’ll get as far as we can. We checked multiple weather sources and
determined that the “storm” was really only a cold front and only a few inches
of snow is expected Tuesday night. We stopped by a climbing store in the town
and bought two pairs of micro-spikes (basically baby crampons that slip on over
your boots) from a girl a few years older than me who has done some seriously
legit climbing all over the world. She seemed to think that would be enough and
we would be able to make it, plus I’ll be able to use the micro-spikes when
hiking in Colorado or Alaska in the future, or for walking the dog around the
block in the winter.
After our last minute gear stops and a trip plan text to our
mothers, Aidan and I drove to a cute little campsite near the trailhead of Mt.
Whitney. We still had a good bit of daylight left, so I washed some clothes and
set them out to dry in the sun. Aidan set up the hammock and we rested in the
afternoon and discussed our options for our summit attempt.
Since the storm was scheduled to move in Tuesday evening, we
decided that it might be a good idea (although a bit crazy) to get up early
tomorrow (like 4:00am) and try to hike all the way up on Tuesday and then camp
on the way down. We decided that this would be a good plan because even if we
get up to our designated camp spot and the weather looks crappy we could just
hole up in the tent, spend the night, and then try to summit the next morning
as previously planned. We tried to get another forecast on the weather but were
unable to and so decided to just got forth with this idea and hope for the
best.
The rest of the evening was spent making additional
preparations for out rip and going over the plan multiple times (for some
reason that makes me feel better about it). We made a big dinner of chicken
dumpling soup, to which we added a bag of frozen peas and a package of roasted
chicken ramen, and we also made grilled cheese. There were enough dry sticks
scattered around our campsite to build a small fire, and so we topped off
dinner with two s’mores that made quite a mess (like any good s’more should
do!).
After dinner we staged our food and gear that we plan to
bring along with us up the mountain in the morning. I think that all things
considered we are pretty well prepared. We have a pouch of emergency instant
mashed potatoes if we get desperate before we resort to cannibalism. Our plan
is to go to bed early (around 9:00pm) tonight so that we can still get a good
night’s sleep before our big hike tomorrow.
I hope that you are enjoying your summer in Boston! We will
have to got on some urban adventures when I get back in August before you head
off to grad school. I miss you and hope you are doing well!
Your friend,
Emily
No comments:
Post a Comment