Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Few basic questions

First of all, thanks for this portal. It has a wealth of information for people who want to hike Mt. Whitney.

Six of us are planning to hike Whitney this year and have been training for some time. Here are a few questions in our minds --

1) When: Till what time of the year, should first timers plan to hike Whitney? Is end-of-September okay?

2) Conditioning and fitness level: How do you know that you are ready for Mt. Whitney. All of us ran SF Half-Marathon after 4 months of training. We have been hiking (5-6 mile hikes with 2000 feet elevation gain) regularly at sea-level. We hiked Mt. Dana last weekend. It took us 6.5 hours to finish the hike. I know it is not a great time but is that good enough?

What other high-altitude and longer hikes can we do in Northern CA?

3) Permits: We do not have permits. But on multiple threads on this forum, I have read that day hike permits are not that difficult to get if you show up the day before the hike. Is it okay to go with that theory? Anybody here who got permit like that recently?

Thanks a lot. This forum has been a tremendous help.

We really need expert advice from folks on this forum. Please give us your opinions and feedback.

September is the best month to be in the Sierra Nevada.

You sound fit, just try to get some long mountain and hill walks in. Dana is good, but Cloud's Rest would be better preparation for Whitney.

1. When...mid-September would be better. Make sure you bring some warmies, it can get awfully cold this time of year.

2. Conditioning and fitness...It seems your fitness is top notch, the conditioning part is suspect. You need to be out on the trail for more hours to get use to the time element.

3. Permits...Generally, are not a problem for day hikers. However, you never know for sure. To increase your odds, plan to hike on Tuesday through Thursday.

Thanks a lot wbtravis5152 and garys.

A great aclimatization hike and test of readiness when you are on your Whitney adventure is to climb White Mountain first. It is a short drive out of Bishop (past the Bristlecone Pines) to 12,000" on the flank of White Mt. It is a 7 mile hike to the summit. At 14,246" White Mt. is the third highest peak in California.

I would definitely increase the distance of your hiking, with as much elevation gain as possible. I did NOT summit last week, mostly due to AMS once over 12.5K, but my legs were whipped as well. The 16 miles I did that day taught me a lot about what it means to be working your body for 13-14 hours, especially at that elevation. I lost 11 pounds over the course of 24 hours.

My training lesson learned for the future (for a dayhike) - lots'a miles and as much elevation gain as possible. There are few flat areas on the MMWT - it's uphill for most of the 11 miles and will really fatigue your legs. My average training hikes for the 8 weeks prior were 10-11 miles 3-4 times a week, with a few days of 14 or so. At 1000 feet elevation, it wasn't enough.

Good luck with the permits and the hike!

@bulldog34, sorry to hear that you could not summit last week. I am very surprised though given your training regimen. 40 miles a week is a lot of miles.

We will take your advice and do more of long-distance hikes at higher elevation.

Thanks a lot and all the best for your next attempt.

Iam from BayArea too, and day hiked Whitney 2 weeks ago along with a guy i met on this forum.

Permit: We got the permit for Mon at 2pm on Sun. We were the first to ask for the unused permit and there were at least 30 more available. Week days you should be able to get.

Training:Trained for 2months - 30min at gym daily, Mission peak(once), PG&E trail(thrice) and BlackMountain(once). I think your training is more than sufficient by my standards.

Trial: Should be able to summit if you take it slow and steady, keep hydrated and eat often. Except for weather or really bad AMS, people with avg fitness can complete the hike.We took exedrin for AMS as suggested in forum and did not have any major AMS issue except slight headache. We did nothing else for AMS due to lack of time, we stayed at lonepine.We completed hike in ~15hrs(4.30am to 7pm no speed records, summit and enjoy the hike).

My boyfriend and I also live in the Bay Area (SF) and climbed Whitney at the end of July. Actually, I wanted to run the SF half marathon but that was the wknd we were at Whitney.

There is nothing at serious altitude here as you know. Aside from walking the hills of SF with a pack for months, we did a bunch of local hikes (Mt.Tam, Diablo, Mission Peaks some hikes on the peninsula and hiked in Tahoe up to 10,000 ft the wknd before Whitney). We also did 5 or 6 - 25 mile walks around the city just to get used to walking for that long of a time. We also run a lot as well. Personally, I felt that helped a lot with the endurance. Sounds like you have done some good training and should be ok as long as you don't get AMS or push beyond your limitations. We saw 2 people who got very sick on the summit and a few people really struggling getting up the switchbacks. We also hiked up 11,700 the day before (Kearsarge Pass) to get used to the altitude before the Whitney climb so between that, hydrating really well, and being physically fit, fortunately, we had no problems. We left trail head at 2AM and reached the summit at 9AM, hung out at the top for a half hour and got back down in 6 hours.

Have a great time!

Permits should not be a big problem if you go mid-week. Two weeks ago, on a Wed, all the day hikes did actually get used, but that is unusual. Be at the ranger station in a timely manner (see the link on this message board, it is very helpful).

Go slow and steady to avoid AMS. That's my opinion anyway, everyone has there own ideas, but it has always worked for me; and the collorary holds true... everytime some inexperienced partner of mine has been beset by AMS, it seemed they were pushing too hard. It's not that hard to monitor your own pulse, you don't even need any fancy gadgets...

Good luck.

lkothari, even though I hiked well over 200 miles in the 8 weeks prior to Whitney - often with 30-plus pounds on my back - it's just not the same at lower elevation. I thought my legs were well-prepared between the mileage and elevation gain (most of my training was on the most rugged sections of the AT in northern Georgia - where 30% of the App Trail GA-ME through-hikers call it quits before they're even out of the state). Once I got to Lone Pine, I did 3 acclimatization hikes at 10K-12K feet (Cottonwood Lakes/Pass) and felt good. On Whitney, once I got past Trail Camp (12K feet) and started the switchbacks, AMS hammered me out of the blue. I pushed on above 13K - past the cables and nearing Trail Crest - but felt I had to turn back with my symptoms since I was solo. That, and I was moving soooooo much slower. Remember, you still have to get down, and it ain't an easy trail in either direction.

Having never had AMS before, despite spending a lot of time at 12-14K feet in Colorado, the thing I regret the most is not getting over to White Mountain and acclimating above 12K. I didn't want to burn out on a 14 mile White Mtn hike just prior to Whitney, but I could have spent good, quality time around/above 13K pretty easily without trekking all those miles to the summit. I wish I had done that - probably would have gotten me near Whitney's summit before AMS had a chance to rear it's ugly head. In my pre-Whitney posts on this board, White was recommended a number of times. Wish I'd listened. There seems to be a real wall for many Whitney dayhikers between 13K and 13.7K feet - basically the cables to Trail Crest.

I'll probably not try another dayhike. but I'll definitely be back next year (permit permitting . . .)for an overnighter at Trail Camp before pushing on for the summit. Whatever you do, though, enjoy and absorb the experience. This is a special mountain and every minute of a hike here is worth the effort. The summit is just icing on the cake for us first-timers!

My husband and I have hiked Whitney twice (2007, 2008) and plan a 09-09-09 hike (wave if you see a short petite red haired 53 year old woman with glasses being escorted by a handsome silver haired Irishman around 59 years old).

The first hike came after a chance comment by my husband's boss Searl Tate, a Whitney veteran. We had just completed the biggest hike of our lives - 20 miles over 11 hours, with a 3000 foot elevation gain at Pt. Mugu State Park to Tri-Peaks, the highest point in the Santa Monica Mts. (Alright, now you Sierra hikers - don't laugh! We all start somewhere...). Searl said, “Hey, if you can do that, you can do Whitney!” At first we said, “No, crazy, insane…do you really think?”

We spent the next 3 months hiking our butts off, with local training hikes from Islip Saddle to Mt. Baden-Powell (3000-foot elevation) and the entire 12 mile 6000 foot hike to Mt. Baldy. We hiked to Lone Pine Lake 3 days before, but really felt like we were ready when we hiked Meysan Lakes, starting in the dark as we would for the Whitney Hike. Yes, we had AMS, but managed to control it as we slowly hiked to the summit. I like to think the slower hike was a helpful factor, at least for us. As Bulldog knows, that 09-12-07 hike almost ended in disaster, with a nice 6-hour sleepover at the rock footbridge because we hiked a bit TOO slow, had a late start, and thus got lost in the dark.

09-17-08 we again prepared during the summer in our area with Tri-Peaks, Baden-Powell, and Mt. Baldy (tough hike). When we hit Lone Pine, we hiked Kearsarge Pass and Robinson Lake for elevation, as well as Horseshoe Meadows. This Whitney hike was much faster, with some slightly worse AMS – maybe the faster hike made it worse, I do not know.

This year we have increased our distance hiking and added trail running, as well as marathons and half marathons. Every Sunday for the last 3 years we hiked or ran 10-20 miles. In the last 10 months, my husband has completed 3 marathons (WWW Marathon was one) and 7 half marathons, while I’m eating his dust with a 10 miler at the WWW Marathon, LA marathon (my first), and 7 half marathons. We have done Vincent Gap to Baden-Powell 3 times, (he runs that darn thing up and down, I can only run down). We were going to hike Islip to Baden-Powell last Sunday, but ran into 2 baby bears one mile in to Little Jimmy campground, with no Mama in sight – we turned and left very quickly and that ended that hike! We hope to hike Mt. Baldy this weekend or next weekend, if the forest fires die down. Otherwise, our last big hiking events for distance, steepness, and elevation will have to take place on 09-06 (Lone Pine Lake hike) and 09-07 (Horseshoe Meadows trail run), rest 09-08, and hike 09-09.

I’m in the best physical shape of my life at 53 years of age, better than when I was in my 20s and 30s when I didn’t exercise or exert myself at all. Mr. Thighs of Steel (husband) has run or hiked since his early 20s, so he has always been in great physical condition. Will all of this training assist us in summitting this year with mild to no AMS? Heavens, who knows! There is a tremendous element of plain old luck for any major hike like this – sometimes the stars are in alignment and sometimes they are not.

Cecelia's point about pace is well-taken. That may have been the biggest contributing factor in my AMS last week. I tend to hike at a fairly fast pace - 3+ mph over anything other than steep terrain. Below 5000 feet, that is. Having hiked so many miles pre-Whitney, I was in a mindset of pushing hard uphill for conditioning purposes. I knew I would have to throttle back on the MMWT and watch my pace closely, but some habits are hard to break. Too often I found myself walking faster/harder than I knew was good for me.

The great advice you'll get on this board is generally sound and should be followed: purpose-train, acclimate prior, hydrate regularly, snack often, take Advil, etc, and pace yourself. Failing to do any one of these can bring the whole house of cards down.

Also, Cecelia's story of she and her husband's first Whitney hike is a cautionary tale and should be read by every Whitney first-timer. I believe it was posted on this board around 8/20. Fortunately they ended up OK, but it could have gone downhill for them quickly if weather had moved in or her husband's AMS had gotten worse.

Thanks a lot vin, LeighAnnSF, melville1955, Cecelia and bulldog34 for some really insightful advice.

As part of the training, we will be doing Mt Diablo and Mission Peak(twice) this weekend. Next week we will try to do White Mountain. And then if we all feel comfortable, we will head out to Whitney portal on a weekday.

You guys have been tremendous help. Thanks.

Ha, I didn't notice you were local (to Me). I live halfway between Mt. Diablo & Mission Pk. A great training hike for Whitney would be to go from Mission Pk to Del Valle (you start on the East side of Mission - don't climb it unless you really want a workout). I think it is about 22 mi. I did it years ago training for a New Mexico summer outing. The reason it is good for Whitney ??? Most people are better in shape for going up, rather than down. Unless it is the end of the season, the hike down is always hard on my knees and calves. Mission to Del Valle climbs up and down for 20 mi. but the last 2 mi are straight down switchbacks to the lake at DelValle. If you can climb the steps to work the next day, at work, without much pain, then you will know you are ready for the Whitney downclimb...