Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Sleeping altitude and altitude sickness

Coming from sea level I have always worried about altitude sickness. If one can't sleep at the portal the night before starting up the trail, how much does it hurt you to sleep lower (like Tuttle creek or Lone Pine campground. I guess they would be at about 6000 feet. Is there really that much advantage being 2000 feet higher the night before? If there was you would see a lot more people driving up to Horse shoe meadows campground. Even though it is way out of the way, it is at 10,000 feet.

Everyone is different when it comes to altitude. I have had problems down to 7,500' other people can go to 11,000' and not have a problem, like my wife.

If you are coming from sea level and will have never camped at 8,300' I might spend a couple days acclimatizing in the area. Just be aware both Lone Pine and Tuttle Creek get awfully hot during the day during the summer.

Does 2,000' make a difference? Sometimes, last year we moved from Upper Crabtree Meadow to an area above Guitar Lake, from 10,700' to 11,700' after being over 10,000' for 4 days. Our whole was dizzy and short of breathe setting up camp.

The bottom line is do what you think is best to protect your Whitney investment.

Bill

Of course it is best to aclimate a day at the portal if you can. I come from about 200' above sea level and my first time up we stayed overnight at the portal campground and I got a little woozy just out of the portal. We had only gone about a mile. So, we waited there on the trail for about an hour while I ate some crackers and drank a lot of water. We stayed at Lone Pine Lake camp that night (we had a three day pass) That was the only time I had a problem. As far as sleeping goes, once I had my tent up I slept like a rock. The 2nd time I went up I only waited at the portal about 4 hours before starting up and went a little slower and had no problem at all. Some people never have a problem with altitude sickness while others can get it over and over as they get higher. The best advise I got was from my sister who recognized it as altitude sickness right away and had me stop where I was. I just thought it was being dizzy and nasious from the clean air. Hope you don't have any problems and good luck on your hike.

check out this site: www.high-altitude-medicine.com

A link there has therapy for rapid ascents:
http://www.high-altitude-medicine.com/AMS-medical.html#AMS-therapy

Coming from about 500' above sea level, flew into Reno, drove down to Bishop. Next day went up to the Bristlecone Pine forest & over to the White Mt. trail. Turned around early due to altitude, didn't summit White Mt. & headache didn't go away as i drove down. spent the next day hanging around Bishop (about 4,000') taking it easy. drove up to the Portal the day after that & camped at the campground before starting up the Whitney Trail. I think it helped getting a night @ 8,000'. Felt a little lethargic at trail camp & spent the night there before summitting Whitney the next morning. nice view. www.joshhikes.com

It also depends on where you plan to stay the next night on the trail. If you plan to stay at Outpost Camp (10,350 feet) then you probably don't need to worry. If you're going all the way to trail camp (12,000 feet), well, that last mile above Trailside Meadow under full pack can be pretty brutal.

Make sure you run up to the Portal to see if you can get a walk-in site the night before your hike--though you might get dinged by ReserveUSA for cancelling or no-showing!

I climbed Whitney last year and had a great deal of problems acclimating to altitude, not unlike many folks. So this year in anticipatiion of our March 1st expedition, I spoke to MDs about the pros and cons of Diamox and to other climbers about various potients, superstitutions and remedies and, after countless hours of investigative study, here is what I finally decided on....

HYDRATION...HYDRATION...HYDRATION

I drank so much water the week preceeding the trip (2 gallons daily) and right through the 5 day climb (3-5 quarts daily) I thought I was going to vomit. And guess what happened???? I HAD ABSOLUTELY NO PROBLEMS WITH ALTITUDE ACCLIMAZATION this year.

My two cents...try to spend a day at 6k-8K if you can and then drink yourself silly.. It's simple but it works (and it ended up being what the MD I spoke to said was the best way to acclimate to Whitney...he was right on!

Hope this helps..

I live near St. Louis, MO, at about 500', so essentially sea level. On trips both to Mt. Ritter (13,150') and Whitney, I have spent at least one night and preferably two at Mammoth Lakes (we fly into Reno and drive down 395), and do a day hike to at least 10,000' or higher the day between. Our normal base camp for Mt. Ritter is between 9,500' and 10k, so similar to Outpost. When we did Whitney, we went all the way to Trail Camp and camped there.

I agree with the comments about good hydration, but spending a couple of days at 8,000' or so (like Mammoth Lakes) with a dayhike up higher will definitely help control AMS symptoms. That regimen has worked both for me over a period of years where I was in my late 30s to early 50s and the later trips with my son where he went from about 6 to 12.

Details at http://www.mtritter.org

I agree with the hydration theory. I think most altitude effects at Sierra's relatively low altitudes are secondary to dehydration. Drink, drink, drink.

I live about a mile from the beach. On our trip 2 years ago, we drove up to Horseshoe directly from here. Stayed there overnight, woke up the next morning feeling the worst hangover-like effects ever. Didn't go away for a good hour after we drove down a couple thousand feet.

I agree with all the previous comments regarding the importance of acclimation and hydration.

A study sited at http://www.high-altitude-medicine.com/hot-topics.html indicates that Ginko Biloba can help prevent altitude sickness. Anyone have first hand experience with it? Does it work?

Best Regards.

AC Student - we have taken ginkgo on three summits of Whitney and it definitely worked for us. Start taking it about two weeks out. Do not forget aspirin on the day of your hike and drink lots and lots of water. Good luck!

I've been reading DRINK, DRINK, DRINK. Very true, but don't forget to EAT, EAT, EAT.

When I started doing 14ers, I kept very hydrated and still had headaches and nausea. After a few trips, I realized I felt better after some snacks.

A good rule of thumb for me is to take a drink every half-hour as I'm hiking and eat every hour. It doesn't have to be much. Half of a power bar at each stop works for me, and be sure to eat on the summit- whether you're hungry or not (and you probably won't be if you're like me). No Vitamin I needed.

Of course, backpacking is a little different, especially when everything smelly has to be in bear-resistant containers. Eat more, less often.

And sleeping at altitude- I've found it helps, but the best is getting excercise. Excercise high, sleep low is what I've heard. Of course everyone's different and sometimes that's not the easiest thing to do.

BTW, an ice-cold coke at the bottom of the mountain does wonders.

Although I agree with the suggestion of eating and drinking well to ward off the effects of altitude, I have to disagree with a previous post suggesting exercise high, sleep low. This is exactly the opposite of what is likly to improve your fitness. From a human performance standpoint it is preferable to sleep high and exercise (train) low since oxygen carrying capacity can improve with rest at altitude but physical performance is impaired at altitude. Competitive runners, among others, have know this for some time. A word of caution about this technique is that the benefits DO NOT occur overnight. The benefits are noticed after a prolonged practice of this technique. If "amyb" noticed a benefit from pre climb activity I can't deny it but I suspect the benefit might have been the result of several factors.

I can't doubt that it could have been a number of factors that improved my performance at altitude. I can see where you're coming from on sleep high, exercise low. I guess there are also other factors to consider. What is high altitude? What is low? On Everest, for instance, they climb to altitude, then sleep at a lower altitude for recovery, and climb higher each day. Olympic athletes train in the mountains of Colorado to increase performance, but they're living at at least 10,000ft. I was explaining what worked for me (I live at 6,500ft-high for some, low for me)- everyone is different. And the effects of altitude can be different for everyone.

My understanding was that excercising at high altitudes can eventually increase red blood cell count, which allows you to work more efficiently with less oxygen, (obviously, a prolonged effect. On shorter timescales, one would get used to exertion at altitude and understand how they need to cope with effects) then, when the body is resting, and healing, more oxygen can be used for that process. I noticed when looking at resources for my climb, that they suggest climbing to 10,000-11,000ft for a couple of days before attempting Whitney, even if they are staying in town.

I'm not trying to cause unrest here, I'm just explaining my understanding. I'm not a doctor and I would definitely be interested in seeing results of any studies on this topic. I see you guys have a lot of resources.

amyb,
There is no unrest in a honest dialog and I'm not a doc, either. I bet Bob R. has a good no nonsense link/reference on the topic at hand. Let me clarify my previous post. I was challenging the idea that it was the exercise that was accelerating your altitude adjustment phase. During your exercise you just happened to be going higher than your sleeping altitude for that day. In doing so you were gaging your very own altitude barrier. Since we can not put a specific altitude limit on any one individual on any given day literature often suggests an altitude limits based on some sample size used during the gathering of data. Boy would it be easy if the data were approprite for the entire population! Your pre climb day hike took you up to an altitude that was comfortable for you on that day. Presumably you could test out higher the next and so on. You could have also gone up to your highest comfortable altitude and slept there rather than descending. The body seems to have this remarkable built in system that protects us - it puts us in a quivering heap if we try to ascend too fast. Kind of like your own personal altimeter. We can either wait for our own unique physiology to adjust or as many do going up Mt. Whitney one can try to minimize the impact. In my opinion, and it is only that and I know nobody asked for it, I think too often people want to accept lore as opposed to fact to solve the problem.

Hi, One book on studies for elevations and effects "Going Higher" (The story of Man and Altitude)by Charles S. Huston M.D. This book list 40 pages of studies on the subject. This is the 250-300 page verison.

What we see on the mountain leads us to ask how long, and how much, First time hikers may travel to fast, carry heavy loads and may have never been on their feet for 16-18 hours or exposed to the outdoors that long at one time.
So when we hear of altitude problems other factors may make it worse, One must turn around and get to a lower elevation !

We will move back to the Portal in about 2 weeks and each year we find that it takes us several weeks to work a full day, and I need about 2 hours of extra sleep a night to feel rested.Can one adjust to altitude ? I would like to see a study on "adapt" to elevation , How one changes the engery output and breathing and food and water intake and also the mind/body control.

Thanks for the book reference Doug. In case folks don't know who Charles S. Houston, M.D. is they should check out the book "K2 The Savage Mountain" written by Houston and Robert H. Bates in 1954. Classic mountaineering literature.

It has been great to read so many responses. Thanks. Consider reading the Medicine and High altitude post by Bob R. It says above 2500 M (8202 feet), it is best not to go up more then 600M (1968 feet) per day. If you have the time this works great and has goten even our most sensitive altitude adjuster high up on the mountain.

I question I have is when we talk about altitude problems it seems most are talk about sleeping at altitude. So for those of us who do Whitney in a day ( hike high Sleep low) are their any recommendations on how long we should acclimatize at the portal before doing the day hike? To lessen the chance of experiencing problems

Last year I arrived at the portal mid-night Thursday, Didn’t sleep very well. Friday went for a short hike ate breakfast, “That is one big Pancake” hung around camp.

At Noon- 2:30 went to Lone Pine to get the permit ate Lunch Etc.. That night tried to sleep but couldn’t, got up a 4:00am Saturday started hike I felt great all the way to Trail Crest.

Then the mother of all headaches hit half way to the top. I kept going got to the top and could only stay for 15min and started back down. By the time I got to Consultation Lake Headache was gone (took Advil).

Last year I was taking Aspirin and Ginkgo didn’t seem to work. I also felt that I was very hydrated I drank 200 oz of water from the Portal to Trail Crest.

I am doing it again this year and would love to avoid that Pain. So any recommendations, More Time, Diamox,

thanks