Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Conditions On Baldy

Hey everyone, My friend and I are hiking mt whitney on July 1 and we are planning to hike baldy this weekend to practice using an ice axe and crampons. Does anyone know if there is still enough snow in a safe area on Baldy to practice self-arresting + glissading techniques?
We're pretty strong hikers but unexperienced in the snow. We live in Santa Barbara and heard Baldy might be the closest place to us to get some snow practice in before we attempt whitney.

Thanks!

Hi Vikram
This was the snow conditions of Mt. Baldy's Baldy bowl/Ski-hut trail last Sunday. Most of trails were 95% free of snow. There were snow fields left the tree section of 8400-8600ft and 9400-9800ft. You can hike through the trail without traction device or ice axe. Snow would be much less by now. Devils' backbone trails and Register ridge trails were free of snow. There was still large snow field left between Baldy summit and west Baldy. Snow was hard packed old snow, so it was icy early in the morning.
You can experience walking on snow with crampons from Baldy summit to West Baldy. Any other part of snow fields was "NOT" recommended for practicing self-arrest or glissading, especially North facing slop. Most of fatal accidents took place on northside slopes.
You can check the south-east facing slope of west Baldy. (Never try towards west or north slope directions. Not safe at all.)
There was good snow filed in Goode canyon, a canyon between Baldy and West Baldy. But this canyon is very deep and not safe for this time of the year.
Good luck on your training and be safe.
Good snow season is over....

https://photos.app.goo.gl/e9nEv3Vvc8fjxZ239

P.S.
Thank you very much Forest service for cutting down all dead trees from the trail.

Thanks Shin! I guess our best option will be to get to Lone pine a few days earlier than planned and find some hikes around there to practice before taking on Whitney

There are plenty of places (north facing) that will still have snow...

You could do an acclimatization hike up in the Horseshoe Meadows area, or up above Onion Valley and pick a shaded slope for your practice...

Many hikers are training for Mt. Whitney or mountains in Sierra on Mt. Baldy lately.
I have climbed 12 times in the past as one day hike. Richard P. and "Crazy" Jack climbed nearly 200 times each. They are really crazy.

My very first Mt. Whitney hike was a textbook perfect disastrous hike in 2006. I was invited by my friend to join with his family members, his relatives, family member's friend, and 3 hikers from same company, in total of 10. Everyone met each other first time at the trailhead.
The group stayed together till Outpost camp. The group slowly got separated into 3 small separate groups around Trail camp. No visual contact or communication among us at all. His relative developed AMS near Trail Crest and turned around by himself. The leader ditched the rest of members behind and took off to the summit and bragged about being the first one on the summit. I heard next day from his wife that 3 hikers from same company took 22 hours to finish and fell off from the tail but nearly escaped from a bad injury. One group lost their supplies near Trail camp on the way down. We didn't see each other as a hiking party rest of the day. No true leader, no solid plan, no plan B, no physical or mental endurance..............I didn't see him ever since.
After this disastrous hike, I decided not to hike with a meetup group, a large group with different intentions and expectations from the hike, and each member in different level of physical and mental conditions.

I studied Mt. Whitney main trail and compared with Mt. Baldy trails for training purpose. I separate Mt. Whitney trail in 4 different segments so I can relate to Mt. Baldy trails.

Mt. Whitney ( Ele -- Miles -- Elvgain )
Portal : 8365
Outpost Camp : 10360 -- 4.6 -- 433ft/M
Trail Camp : 12040 -- 2.5 -- 672ft/M
Trail Crest : 13650 -- 2.2 -- 731ft/M
Summit : 14495 -- 2.5 -- 338ft/M
Total : -- 23.6 -- 519ft/M

Mt. Baldy
Manker/Ski-hut: 6160
Summit : 10064 -- 4.6 -- 848ft/M

Bear Canyon : 4260
Summit : 10064 -- 6.4 -- 906ft/M

Manker/Notch : 6160
Summit : 10064 -- 6.8 -- 574ft/M

Baldy 6 peak loop
Baldy village : 3904
Ice house parking- Village-West Baldy-Baldy-Harwood-Notch-Thunder-
Telegraph-Timber-Ice house parking
Summit : 10064 -- 20.1 -- 306ft/M

You can make many mixed hiking options to gain physical and mental training on Mt. Baldy.

If the one person is performing 90% of ability, 3 member party is performing 72.9% level as a team. The more the member in the team, the level of performance will go down. It is a good idea to make a hiking plan based on the least capable person's level and test it out before the hike not on the hike. If you have to stop every 15 minutes for ten different people, it will slow you down as a team. I am assuming everyone in the team is your true friend to look out for you when you are in need.

In order to enjoy the famous cheeseburger, it is a very good idea to train yourself or member for physical and mental endurance to hike over 20 miles with maintaining safety of team member before the dream hike.

Have a great hike.

The elevation gain on Mt. Whitney : 11.8 miles -- 6130 feet
Ski hut trail : 4.6 miles -- 3904 feet
Bear Canyon trail : 6.4 miles -- 5804 feet

The Bear canyon trail is 1/2 shorter but almost twice steeper than main trail of Whitney.

We have to consider the height of Mt. Whitney, oxygen level, and fatigue factor on very long committed hike. No comparison to Mt. Baldy at all.

Also consider the Vivian Creek Trail on San Gorgonio. Less elevation gain than the Bear Canyon trail on Baldy, but more altitude, and longer. The long downhill run on the Vivian Creek Trail is a good experience for people planning a first-time one-day hike of Whitney. Making the summit on Whitney can be less trying than the long downhill run.

However, Bear Canyon trail is very steep which is good training for the distance of Whitney too. Steeper and shorter training is better than longer and less steep. I summited Whitney 10 times starting at age 45 and Bear Canyon was always one of the last 2 hikes before my Whitney day. Vivian Creek was the other one.

Good morning all,

Curious if anyone knows where the remains of Julian Sands were found on Baldy. The news reports say the identity has been positively confirmed but no details on location.

I don't have any connection to that search but as always, thank you to all the SAR team members for their time and efforts.

Regards,

Locals saw rescue helicopters south of the Baldy summit, but no word yet on precise location.

Interesting. Not where I would have guessed based on my trips up Baldy. There is a spot early on the Devil's Backbone trail that is very thin and exposed. As many harry places as I have been that one always makes me nervous. Can't imagine what its like in winter conditions.

Thanks.

It will be interesting to find out. I had tentatively ruled out the Devil's Backbone because he was an experienced mountaineer who knew the mountain well, and therefore I assumed too sensible to take the Devil's Backbone alone under the conditions at the time. Also ruled out the Bowl on the grounds that he would have been found quickly. Given Graham's excellent report on conditions that day, I would not rule out falling off the west side of the ridge we take from the Ski Hut to the summit. (Some people call it the West Ridge, which it is viewed from the Ski Hut. I call it the South East Ridge, which it is viewed from the summit.)

I have two other questions that puzzle me. First, media reports keep mentioning a cell phone ping about two days after Sanders disappeared. Isn't the Baldy area still pretty much of a dead zone for cell phones? Second, did he have both a helmet and a satellite-based SOS device? If you have both, your chances of surviving a fall and being able to send an SOS are in my opinion fairly good, e.g., around 50-75%.

I never heard mention of a satellite comms/SOS device.

My search experience with cell phones and towers is somewhat dated now but still applicable I think. A victim can be in a "no service" area but still "seen" by a tower or towers (yours or another carrier). A tower or towers can detect a phone but not have a strong or consistent enough signal for voice or even text communication. Search Coordinators will often ask cell service providers for assistance by manually checking cells near the search area for any kind of signal from either the subjects phone or any phone during a particular time period.

Cell signals can be affected by so many things in fringe areas and good location information usually needs more than a single cell tower receiving the phones signal. The newer higher end iPhones have satellite SOS capability and features like fall detection with automatic emergency notification which the Garmin inReach, SPOT, etc do not have. The tech keeps getting better which is of course good but its also giving people a greater sense that the the tech will save them from all the things that traditionally generate SAR missions.

Thanks, Foxrider, that was helpful.

Some are speculating Goode Canyon based on flight tracking data showing the sheriff copter spending considerable time circling that area.

Which is where it would be if he fell down the west side of the Southeast Ridge. I remember Graham commenting in his report on descending the tricky 'off-camber' place on the ridge, on the day Sanders disappeared. I once took off my crampons for the descent, and had some nervous moments there regretting it.

He was in Goode Canyon not far from the plane wreck. Here’s the coordinates provided by the hiker who found him. 34.2778309, -117.6494619

Rest in peace fellow hiker.

Outstanding!

Thank you.

A man's place of death is outstanding?

What you are referring to as the Southeast Ridge is due south of the peak. The only feature I would consider southeast of the peak is the Bowl. If anything, this ridge should be referred to as the South Ridge.