Can't believe it's taken me this long to write up a TR! Sadly, I may not remember some of the details.
Bob and I left Orange County on May 27 and headed for the Portal where we camped the first night. Absolutely beautiful there! We headed about 1/2 mile up the trail shortly after we arrived just to check it out. Woke the next morning hoping for some pancakes for breakfast at the Portal Store, but Doug had just turned on the griddle and it wasn't hot yet. Had some coffee, went back to camp for a bite, packed, and hit the trail headed for Trail Camp.
It was a long and slow hike in, and we stopped a couple of times to put on and take off our crampons. Seems we would hit snow and think "this is it" then round a bend and the snow would be gone. Got off trail a few times, but quickly found it again - sometimes with thanks to my GPS, others just by going back to where we last knew the trail was and looking more closely.
A group of 3 others caught up to us with whom we ended up hiking, more or less, the last portion of the way to Trail Camp, which was nice.
The last leg up to Trail Camp was tough in the snow. The sun was setting and it got cold really fast. Determined to "just get there" I neglected to stop and put on more clothing. I felt I was warm enough from hiking and would deal with it when I took off my backpack, which turned out to be a bad idea. Shortly after we got to camp I was so cold I couldn't do anything. I put on every piece of clothing I'd packed, had my legs in one sleeping bag and the other over the top of me. I was exhausted, and had no energy to do anything. To make matters worse, it was too late for us to practice glissading and self-arrest -- both of which neither Bob nor I had ever done.
Bob cooked dinner while I sat there numb. Our new friends, who camped next to us, offered me some hot water which really helped. I didn't eat much; just couldn't get it down. Finally went to bed with a bottle of hot water, but didn't sleep much. If memory serves, it was about 9 or 10 degrees that night.
Hike in took about 11 hours that day.
The next morning was really cold - couldn't wait for the sun to come out! Ate breakfast, melted snow for our bottles, contributed to our wag bags, and packed a day pack, which Bob would carry.
We had seen pictures and read reports from other people's trips before we left home and I knew the trail above Trail Camp was still iced over. The night before we left someone posted a pretty freaky looking photo of the chute; knowing Bob & I weren't versed in self-arrest or glissading I wasn't sure this was something I wanted to tackle. My fear of heights & falling wasn't helping - I'm one of those people who won't go down that steep, long waterslide. 'Nuff said. I told Bob we'd just have to see when we got there. I wasn't ready to commit to climbing up, knowing I'd have to figure out how to get back down - which terrified me, as did some of the exposed traverses on the back side I'd seen pictures of.
We headed up the trail through the snow to the base of the chute, just like everyone else. As we walked, several others passed us - some quite a bit older than me! I didn't want to come this far and not try... so I decided to head up and see how I felt. Turns out it wasn't too bad going up ... AS LONG AS I DIDN'T TURN AROUND AND LOOK DOWN! I knew that one glance down to see where I was would send me sliding back down, feet first, on my stomach out of sheer terror. So I just didn't look. I looked up, I looked at my footing, and I followed the trail set by the others above me. It was absolutely exhausting, and took over 2 hours. 2 1/2 probably.
When I got to the top, all I could think was "Well THAT was a stupid thing to do. Now how am I going to get back down?" Needless to say, I was scared, and everyone sitting at the top with me knew it! I questioned everyone on how THEY were going to get down, asked how many had glissaded before, who hadn't and if they were going to try it. I even made a group from the Bay Area promise not to go down without me! LOL! Everyone was friendly and supportive.
After resting a bit we started back on the trail. There were a couple exposed traverses, but I managed them fine. There was one in particular that was a bit scary - as I crossed it I fell into the mountain and cracked the viewer on my camera, which was in my pants pocket. Urg!!! Also bumped into Norma there - I knew it was her before I even saw her!
Finally made it to the top - and man, that was the best feeling in the world! Honestly, I wasn't sure I was going to make it, knowing that I hadn't trained as long or hard as I should have, and not being sure how I'd do with the altitude, having only hiked up to 9200' at San Gorgonio. ...and the fact I wasn't sure I'd have the cajones to climb the chute in the first place, knowing that coming back down would be a serious mental challenge for me.
And the best part ... Bob proposed.
We took pictures, called our families, and headed back to Trail Crest. I was thankful that the Bay Area gang were still there when we arrived - just as they promised, they didn't leave without me!
There was a lot of talk about glissading down, which I really didn't want to do! As we began talking about it, one of the guys noticed neither Bob or I had a strap on our ice axe - our rentals from REI - and loaned a strap to me that he had. We had no idea we'd need a strap on there! One of the girls from the Bay Area group said she was going to check out the snow/ice situation, took off her crampons and was prepared to glissade. Another guy, Art, felt the sun had been off the snow long enough that it wasn't a good idea, and started down switchbacking on foot. He ended up stopping on the side of the chute and helping her put her crampons back on, and we all ended up going down on foot, though some did finally glissade from about half way down. (Not me!) I was holding onto that axe the whole way down, knowing it was my only life line. Though Bob and I have experience backpacking in snow, as I'd said, we'd never had any training on how to use an ice axe or self-arrest.
I have to admit, this was pretty scary for me. There were a couple times my crampons didn't dig in right away and I slid a ways. At one point I was literally hanging from my axe! And a few times my foot was stuck in a hole and got tripped up a bit; I could have fallen very easily. Not having ever practiced self-arrest, I could quite honestly have killed myself up there. It took quite a while to get down, and considering the 11 hour hike the day before, and the lack of sleep, my legs were pretty fatigued. I had mixed emotions going through my head walking back to camp - I was so happy I pushed through my fear and made it, but also very aware that what I had done was really dangerous and in many ways stupid. I was just really thankful to be alive, truth be told.
When we got back to camp, Bob and I reversed our roles from the night before. I cooked dinner while Bob sat shivering in the tent with no energy. I gave him hot water, made him eat, and put him to bed with a hot water bottle in his sleeping bag. ...and then I broke out the martini Bob packed for me and shared it with my new friends. If memory serves, it took 9 hours for us to summit and return to Trail Camp.
The next morning we packed up and hit the trail again. As we began down we noticed another hiker taking a trail along the right instead of hitting the switchbacks above Outpost Camp on the left, and decided to follow him. For me, that turned out to be not such a good idea. It wasn't too long before my fatigued muscles started to quiver with every step, and falling would mean a long slide down the slope causing me to do my first ever self-arrest ... WITH A 40# PACK ON. I started to feel really insecure on that long traverse, but had no choice but to plow through it and get it done. There was just no turning back at that point.
After we got below Outpost Camp we finally met up with the trail again, and were surprised to bump into our friends from the Bay Area! I was able to return the strap I'd borrowed from them the night before, and also, we found an area to glissade and I got to try it for the first time, under their guidance! That was pretty awesome!
The rest of the trek out was uneventful. Got to the Portal Store and ate the best cheeseburger I've ever eaten in my life! ...the fries, however, are even better, IMHO!
It was great meeting a few of you in person ... like Calicokat, Norma, Doug, Richard P, and of course, making new friends with Christina, Javier, and Will! Thanks to the gang from the Bay Area for your support, but most of all, thanks to Bob for planning this whole trip - I've been wanting to hike Mt. Whitney for years now, and he made it happen.
In hindsight, I would have made my first attempt under "no snow" conditions. We never imagined there would be such late snow this year. It made the trip so much more challenging than I think it would have been otherwise, with all the extra gear we ended up having to bring. I would have made more of a point to eat - I know we didn't eat enough. Also, I would have started training more than a couple months ahead of time, and would have made more opportunities to hit other local peaks.
In the end, it was an amazing trip - one that I'll never forget.
(All 280 pictures can be found at
Bob & Renee's Mt. Whitney Trip 5/27-31/2010, if interested. I haven't had time to edit out duplicates and stupid stuff - sorry!)
