Returned Victorious

I am back from the adventure. I am victorious! All of us were. Six of us in the group; John, Lee, Brian, Rich, Trent and I. Six of us summited. That was a pretty taxing hike. It was about the toughest hike I've ever done. A couple of the guys got hit with the altitude sickness at various points. I think Brian was the worse off. He said he felt better if he just kept moving.

Lets see if I can sum up the trip without my usual long windedness...

Trent and I left Escondido about 1pm and arrived shortly after the others (coming in from San Luis Obispo). We set up camp for the night and just spent the evening chatting away with each other. The bears were active in the area and we had to make sure everything was out of the cars and into the bear box. To make sure that we did just that a California black bear decided to wander by our camp, not a hundred feet away. And me with my camera still sitting in the car!

Up at a leisurely hour the next morning (must have been around 7am) and began our packing for the trip up to our base camp at Outpost camp (10,400 feet elevation). No point in rushing out that morning for a 3.8 mile hike. A rough 3.8 miles it was. All up switchbacks. We got to camp within a few hours. We still had most of the day to lounge around. I felt a little bitter that we hadn't moved onto Trail Camp a couple miles away. But, I wasn't the planner of this trip. I was just a lucky recipient of an invite.

The next morning we were up and out of camp by 4:37am for our summit day. Yes, that's right folks; I was up before the Sun. I have pictures of the sunrise to prove it. We all had summit packs on with a couple liters of water and just enough personal gear to get up to the summit and back to base camp that day. So, it was a much lighter day. I am thankful for that. When we did arrive in Trail Camp a couple hours later, I thanked John for parking us in Outpost camp the day before. The trail between Outpost and Trail camp is about 2.5 miles and an elevation gain of 2000 feet. I am so glad we didn't have to carry full packs up that. Trail Camp was above the tree line and looked like a moonscape.

Then came the switchbacks. I was told that there are 96 switchbacks here. I counted them...I came up with 98. Heck, I even gave a rough count on the way down. Came up with 98. Others in the party came up with...yup, 98. So, I will say there are 98. Next time I do this (yes, there will be a next time...Barb has to experience this someday) I will count again just to confirm the 98 count.

That leads you to Trail Crest. The pass from the Eastern side of the Sierras to the Western side. What an amazing view. I was speechless...Trent was thankful that I was speechless. Just beyond that was the junction of the JMT. At this point Trent looks at me and says that from this point, he's finally convinced that we're going to make it. If we've made it this far with no problems (other than the standard fatigue and out of breath that you get at over 13,000 feet), we're going to make it. Only serious injury and inclement weather could stop us. We could see for miles around us and no storm clouds could be seen. I signed up for the non-injury summit attempt. So, it looked like we were good to go.

Sure enough, what seemed like several days later, we were climbing the summit itself. The first glimpse of the Mountaineer's Cabin was a vision of triumph. We took our requisite pictures and celebrated our victory in our own personal ways.

The decent was a whirlwind. The hike was much quicker. Mostly because it was downhill. But, partially because we were spent. Physically, mentally and emotionally. I crashed hard when I got back into camp. Not sure if it was the sunburn that I picked up during the day or if it was just my system backlashing, but, I was shivering cold. I bundled up in my sleeping bag for an hour or two and napped. We ate dinner and went to bed.

We slept in the next morning (out of the bag just after 7 in the morning). Damned Sun will wake you up when it rises when you sleep sans tent. We packed up and headed back down to the trail head. Ate our burger at the Whitney Portal Store, picked up a couple souvenirs and parted ways.

I had summited Mount Whitney. Highest peak in the continental states. Sure, it's no Everest. It's no Denali. Several thousand people summit this mountain every year. That makes it no less special to me.

Whitney Proposal

While not exactly out of the country, I still wanted to write an update. On Friday morning, I received an email from a friend of mine, Rich. Rich is the guy who introduced me to Yosemite Valley. He took Marc and I up that way a couple years ago. Some pictures of the trip here. He toured us around the valley. He hiked us up the Misty Trail to Vernal Falls. Drove us to Glacier Point. Hiked us up to the Giant Sequoia groves. He also taught us about the trees there. So much tree knowledge. He is the Lorax...he speaks for the trees. I now take a hiking trip with Rich and a number of other guys (Marc, Trent, Rich, Jeff, Skip and myself) each year. We have a great time hiking around the outdoors. Last year we hiked in the Bear Creek area near Mono Hot Springs.

Sorry for the minor digression...At any rate, Rich had a very last minute proposal for Trent and I in the aforementioned email. Rich has a friend who had a permit for six to summit Mount Whitney. However, they only had four people to go. So, the offer was extended to Trent and myself. We both jumped at the chance. Hot diggity dog! (Who talks like that anymore...)

That was Friday. We leave for the Whitney on Tuesday night. We make our summit attempt on Thursday night. This leaves us very little acclimatization time, IMO. Very little indeed. However, I'm not going to back out because of a little less prep time. I am however, a little apprehensive about the trip as I've never actually been up that high before. Highest I've been was 10,834 feet (San Jacinto Peak in Riverside). I didn't have any altitude issues there. But, that was still about four thousand feet below Whitney's summit.

That and the fact that I've not been as active as I would have liked to have been for this attempt. I have always planned on doing this mountain. I just figured it would be a couple more years before I would get to it. So, a couple years sooner...such is life. Not like I'm in poor shape. Just not in the shape I'd like to be in.

With the altitude, I can take consolation in the fact that we will be sleeping at 10,000 feet both before and after the summit. The plan is to camp ourselves at Outpost Camp as a base camp. We'll take off at 4am for the summit on Thursday and then back down that evening. We'll pack out the next morning.

Very excited. Tuesday can't get here fast enough. I'm already all packed up and ready to go...on Sunday.