Dear Baruch,
Today can best be described as an adventure that you would
have loved! Of course you know
that probably means that it scared me a little bit, and you would be
right. But we did make it out
safely, all fingers and toes accounted for.
Aidan and I began the day at nearly 12,000 ft., camped on
Mt. Whitney under nearly a foot of snow.
We had gone to bed a little worried that 1) the tent might blow away and
2) we might freeze, but thankfully when morning came we had avoided both of
those predicaments. At 6:00 am the
sun was shining and the clouds looked to be parting, giving us hope for a
possible summit of Mt. Whitney, the tallest mountain in the lower 48.
We made breakfast of oatmeal in the Jet Boil after
struggling for a while to get the thing lit in the cold and snow. We ate quickly and packed our bags for
the crazy, but maybe possible, attempt.
Aidan and I each strapped a pair of micro-spikes to our feet for
additional traction on the snow and ice, our substitute for the suggested
crampons, and we stared out on our war.
It seemed to be relatively easy going at first. The 8-10 in. of snow that had
accumulated through the night had drifted considerably and made the going slow
in the morning. When climbing over
snow on a boulder field, it is difficult to predict when your footing might
suddenly give way… Eventually we
reached a snow-covered slope and we started going up again. I made a direct line to the top,
finally thankful to have an excuse to ignore all of the crazy switchbacks
California likes to impose on their trails. Eventually we did end up back on what seemed to be the
trail, and we continued upwards towards the top of the pass. We knew the most difficult section of
the trail was coming up soon. We
hoped that once over the pass (if we made it that far) the trail would easily
work it’s way up the west side of the peak. The view from the east was stunning, though clearly
impossible to scale the cliffs to the summit from there.
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| The summit comes in view! (to the right) |
We traversed across a slope towards a safety rail that I
hoped would give us some stability, but when we finally made it there I
realized that the snowdrifts had almost entirely buried the rail. The 4 ft. tall posts barely reached my
ankle in places, and the steep slope and rocky cliffs below us made each step
all the more nerve-wracking. Not
far beyond that, I decided that this adventure might be getting a little too
treacherous for me. Aidan
thankfully didn’t pressure me too hard to continue, and we begrudgingly turned
around with the new goal of reaching the car. We retraced our footsteps through the snow back to our tent,
and packed up our belongings for the long trek down.
 |
| Navigating the "safety" rail |
 |
| The trail just sort of ends... |
 |
| Someday... |
 |
| Enjoying the snow! |
 |
| Notice the clouds starting to roll back in... |
This is where the story gets interesting. At this point snow covered most of the
already difficult to distinguish trail through the rocks. We were wary of staying too high on the
cliffs for too long, and missing the switchback down (as we had seen two French
women do the day before and had to help find their way back), and so we worked
our way down quickly, guessing at where the trail might be. We ended up with the opposite mistake. Instead of at the top wondering how to
get down, we ended up below the trail wondering how to get up. Thankfully we had a map with us so we
could figure out where we were, and we had a pretty good guess where the trail
might be. We crossed a stream a
couple times before we were able to find a section that looked like it could be
a promising scramble to the top.
Aidan lead the way, and I followed, occasionally passing my backpack up
to him so I had more control to climb some of the more difficult sections. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention, as soon
as we began down the mountain the weather moved back in and it started to snow,
with visibility dropping significantly.
With only a 200 ft. (maybe) scope in any direction, we were struggling
to understand where we might be in relation to the trail. That could be difficult to find on a
clear day. Anyway, long story
short we made it up the cliffs and lo and behold the trail appeared before
us! I have never in my life been
so excited to see footprints in the snow.
I had been beginning to worry that Aidan and I might be forced to spend
another night, this time lost, on Mt. Whitney. Neither of us wanted to have to resort to our emergency
instant mashed potato mix for dinner, so it was a relief to find a safe way
down.
The rest of the hike consisted of plodding though the snow,
as we descended the remaining 3000 ft.
As we got lower the accumulated snow thinned, through the snow falling
from the sky never seemed to let up.
Eventually we began to pass other hikers just beginning their journey up
the mountain. We smiled at them
and wished them lick, thankful that we were heading off and would soon be dry
and warm again. The California
permit system is dumb, and we entered a lottery 3 months ago to try to climb the
mountain. We were awarded a
specific day, and regardless of the weather it was our only chance to
climb. I’m sure all of the people
hiking up as we were coming down were cursing the storm and the luck that it
would fall on their day as well.
 |
| About half way down |
 |
| Getting close! |
Towards the bottom of the trail the snow began to turn to
rain, or some sort of wet frozen crap falling from the sky. We didn’t really care though, we were
just happy to be close to the car.
We finished around mid-afternoon and drove the short distance to our
campsite to set up the already soaking wet tent in the rain again. We changed into dry clothes and stopped
at the Whitney Portal store where they had a hamburger deal with everything on
it and fries for $10. Aidan and I
each got one and we took our time easting inside to avoid having to go back out
in the rain. A group of 8 hikers
from a college in southern California joined our table and provided some
endless entertainment as we ate our burgers, completely exhausted.
As Aidan and I left the store to go back to our campsite we
saw a group of 14 hikers that had been going up when we passed them on the
trail coming back out, giving up after only a couple hours in the storm. I don’t blame them, the weather sucks. Still shivering we ended up spending the
rest of the day hanging out in the car.
At one point the rain/snow/sleet did let up enough and we got started
building a fire, but then the weather picked back up again and we surrendered
to the tent for the night.
Hopefully tomorrow will be a nice day, I really don’t want to pack up
the tent again while it is still precipitating.
Well, I hope you enjoyed my recount of the hike. It is a beautiful mountain, but
strapped under the rules of California unlike the freedom the mountains in
Alaska exhibit. Hopefully we can
go on some more adventures at home this summer. I hope you are staying safe fighting fires!
You are in my prayers.
Your friend,
Emily
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