Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Are the switchbacks accessible?

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Thanks for all the great advice. Our plan right now is to (try) make it to the chute, evaluate the conditions of the snow and then decide how to proceed.

I'm going up July 27, should most of the snow on the trail up to Trail Camp be beaten down or melted by then? Should trail navigation be fairly easy by that time? Thanks

Randy, Everything will probably (qualifier) be clear by the end of July. I've been up Whitney several times in late July and never had a trail problem.

I was on the trail on Saturday and the trail is covered in snow just above Lone Pine Lake. I didn't even make it to where the switch backs would have been because the trail disappears in the snow.

We made it to the Summit on the 22nd as planned!(Well a bit slower then planned) Thanks for all the advice I don't think we would have made it without it.

Trail conditions are mixed. Most of the trail is exposed up passed mirror lake with a few snow patches along the way. There are a few places we had to look for footprints to figure out where the trail goes. The snow passed mirror lake can get dicy as the day warms it up. There a a few time my foot went through and I sank down to my thigh. I expect this to be a risk factor in the following week as the snow is melting from under creating these "floating" fields of snow.
Except for a few cables the switchbacks are not visible nor did we see anyone going up them.
We used Ice axe and crampons to climb the chute. It took us about 2.5 hours to make it to the top of the chute. I recommend trying to hit the chute earlier before it becomes too soft. We did see a few people going up with just hiking boots and trekking poles but I would not recommend it. The shoes barely had enough friction on the snow and the poles are not built to take a side pull in the case of a fall.
The crest trail had a few spots where the trail is blocked with snow and ice.
The last stretch to the summit is covered with snow and we used the crampons and ice axe. We hit the summit at 1pm. This didn't leave us a lot of time to hang out as we wanted to be down the chute before it's in shadow around 4pm. The snow was soft enough that we glissaded slow and easy down.That being said I can see how this can be dangerous when the snow hardens up.
We slowly made it down talking to people going up to the campsites. It was dark by the time we exited the trail.

All in all, Epic!

Looking down chute


Looking Up the chute


The summit


Coming down the chute

Thanks for the information and photos guys. It looks much steeper looking down than it does looking up! Hopefully, for my trip at least, the route to Trail Camp will be fairly clear of snow by the end of July. Thanks again.

Great job, congrats! We are headed up on July 6th, really excited. What time did you start the trail?

We woke up at 1am to break down the camp and drive to the trail head. This can take a bit longer as you have to pack all the items from the bear locker and move them to another bear locker by the trail head.
We stared the hike around 2:20am. If I had to do it again with the existing conditions I would try to be on the trail by 1. Then again I'm a slow hiker.
These were our times:
Top of the chute(crest trail) at 11am
summit around 1pm
Back to the bottom of the chute 3:45
I would have been a lot more comfortable if we were an hour earlier on all those times.
We fell a few hours behind schedule and exited the trail after 9pm.
One mistake we did was entering the dead-end "rock garden" at the bottom of the chute. As I mentioned in my previous post, on the way down we stopped and chatted with multiple hikers going up to the camp sites.

Be safe and have a blast!

I am planning a day hike on July 17th with my two teenage sons. I was also planning on leaving Whitney Portal at around 1:00 AM but I was cautioned that this was too early and I should think about a later time. I'm worried about "losing" the trail in the dark but I'm also worried about having enough time to summit. I'm also concerned about the "chute". Last Oct, my younger son had extreme altitude sickness about 1/2 mile from the summit and the rest of the group 2 adults and 3 teenage scouts left him and me behind...I was the only female in the group. At that time, the trail was very easy to follow although there was still a lot of ice and snow. However, we used the switchbacks both ways. With the "chute", how do you find your way back to the trail? Also, I've been reading accounts of others losing their way because the tracks on the snowfields and meadows go in every direction. Any help/guidance would be appreciated. Also, this time I plan on taking Diamox with me to prevent altitude sickness.

Please take what I say with a grain of salt as this was my first time.
I got a prescription for Diamox but decided not to use it due to some of the claimed side effects. We camped for two days before the hike at the portal. The day before the hike we hiked up to Lone Pine Lake. This helped with acclimatization and getting us familiar with the parts of the trail would would do in the dark.

Once we got down the chute you can stick to the right (depending on snow conditions) until the trail is visible. It is very likely that there will be people camping there and you can get them to point you in the right direction. We missed the trail a few times but not to the point we couldn't find our way back.