Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Whitney training summit #1

Hopefully (permit pending) I will be hiking to Mt Whitney via Cottonwood pass in the summer, so I decided to start this years training. I decided to start with Mount Baldy 10064'. Did the full Devils Backbone Trail starting at Falls Road for a total of 13.6 miles in just under 5 hours. I wanted to do the Baldy Bowl Trail but missed the trail. On the way back I found it so maybe next time. How does the Baldy Bowl Trail compare? I know it is only 8.4 miles r.t. Is it worth it to take this route or should I move on to Gorgonio and San Jacinto? Any thoughts are appreciated. Here are some of the pics. This was my first ever summit.
Devils Backbone Looking Back at the trail almost there Made it!

mrtbones, for pictures to show up, the url between the img tags in your post has to end in ".jpg"

For example, I took your first url, pasted it into another browser page, and saw that you are posting the URL to the flickr page. If you right click on the picture using the Firefox, one of the options is "view image". Clicking that brings up only the picture, with its standalone URL in the address. (Only Flikr adds a "?v=0" on the end. Taking that off gives you the pure url.)

Using Internet explorer and pasting the first address brings up the page, but IE won't give you the picture by itself. But if you right-click the picture and select "properties" (I'm using IE version 7), one of the properties it the picture's URL, again with the ?v=0 at the end. If you copy the url from that and paste it into the place between your [img]...[/img] tags, it will display your picture in your message.

I got this picture's URL by viewing just the picture:
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2096/2451497516_771950c41a.jpg
And pasting it between the url tags gives the picture:


Here are the rest:

Thank you. I appreciate the help. First time posting pics.

mrtbones

Mt Baldy is a great place to train for Mt. Whitney....any route.

The Ski Hut route/ Devils backbone loop is a nice one. I have always liked the Devil's backbone...though it is a little out of the way compared to the Ski Hut route.

http://outdoors.webshots.com/photo/2937065590061435028ldrYyR

If you come down the Devils backbone trail, you don't have to follow the long road all the way down. There is a shortcut, coming straight down under the ski lift from the lodge to the parking lot. It saves a lot of time if you are of the cross country type.

http://outdoors.webshots.com/photo/2762680170061435028ffjeIy

I have removed reference to other cross country options....better left to a discussion outside this forum.

Obviously San Jacinto (from the west side...Marion Creek trail) is a good work out and a worthy route and the summit is 600 feet higher then Mt. Baldy. San Gorgonio is good from any direction, and at 11500 feet is the highest in Southern California.

There are other excellent hikes near Mt. Baldy...if that is convenient area for you....The three T's look and Cucamonga/Bighorn/ Ontario peak are both interesting hikes.

http://outdoors.webshots.com/photo/2843977450061435028uIFRbv


If you are coming to Mt. Whitney via Cottonwood pass, the elevation training (San Gorgonio & San Jacinto verses Mt. Baldy) is less of an issue...being gradual and under 11300 feet the first few days. Last year we did 4 hikes around Mt. Baldy in the few months leading up to our Mt. Whitney one day up the Mountaineers Route...it worked fine

Damn Kashcraft,

Don't tell anyone about that one. I don't want to show up and find half the Toyo Hiking Club going up there ;-)

That is my route of choice for Baldy these days, too. Summit crawl from Baldy/Harwood divide is a walk in the park after the climb to the Devil's Backbone.

The whole of San Antonio Canyon is a great place to train for Whitney.

BTW, go up to Cucamonga Peak via ridge...it will get your heart pumping.

> I wanted to do the Baldy Bowl Trail but missed the trail.

From the signed San Antonio Falls Road, you walk about 0.6 mile to the falls where the road does a hairpin turn. In about another 0.25 mile, the road makes a left turn. In about another 0.12 mile, a trail heads up a steep embankment on your left. It is easy to miss if you don't look carefully - there is no sign. This is the Ski Hut trail that passes by the Sierra Club Ski Hut and under the Baldy Bowl. The NAD27 UTM co-ordinates for the turn off are 442215 3791886. Good luck!!

As Steve indicated, you need to get a URL that ends in jpg.