Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Crazy Langley Summit Routing by NPS?

What's the deal with the crazy routing to the Langley summit that the NPS appears to be putting in place?

Okay, so they put up these cairns-on-steroids on the summit approach. Some of them made us laugh, but at least the first one was marginally useful (see picture below).

But once you get to the crux of the hike the routing was, in my humble opinion (shared by my friends), absolutely crazy.

The issue is that point where you are above 13,000' on the mountain, and you have to navigate the boulder field to get to the summit plateau. You have to cross a sandy chute/wash (which comes up from the northwest) and then go through some boulders.

Two years ago, I found through exploration that the best way (for me, at least) was to cross the sandy wash by heading up and to the right (in deep sand), and then follow some cairns through an easy and short class 2/3 chute with no exposure whatsoever. After literally 20 feet of climbing, you were on the summit plateau, and could work your way around and up to the summit itself.

Now, the Park Service is using these mega cairns (and a deep new trail across the wash) to route people down and to the left (North). So first you have to climb a (concededly short) class 3 chute, with some real exposure (?!?!?!), to get onto the "trail." Now, you are climbing for an interminable period on the steep North scree field of Langley. The trail is marginal (though they clearly are still working on it). More importantly, it is steep and unpleasant, with lots of foot slippage, and fundamentally exhausting. The cairns-on-steriods continue up the slope, mocking the exhausted climbers who put their trust in the marked route.

Needless to say, we chose to descend the more traditional way, i.e., by following the south lip of the Langley plateau around to the West, and dropping through an easy class 2/3 chute to the sandy portion of the trek.

So, now that I have vented, a few pictures.

And thanks to Tracie, who managed to find me and my friend at High Lake on her own day hike of Langley, so we could all summit together. (A friend and I backpacked in the night before and camped at Long Lake.)

We hiked in July 4. Summitted July 5. Hiked out July 6. (Except for Tracie, who did the whole slog on July 5.)

Long Lake



On the way to New Army Pass



Langley approach



Cairn-on-steriods built by the NPS



Summit view (with Skyblue Lake and Iridescent Lake in foreground, Whitney at right rear)



Descending. Cirque Peak in the background.



Storm hits on the way out (July 6)

Karin is being too nice.

Here is my take: Sadistic trail builders leave evil towers tempting unsuspecting hikers to follow up one of the longest, deep and steep sandiest slog-fest ways to the summit. I much prefer the final approach by scramble up and down via the most direct route.

We also saw a Lone young male Nevada big horn running down from Army Point to the area towards upper Soldier Lake. I was unable to get a good pic.

Karen below New Army Pass

Karin and Tracie

I last saw you both on Baldy Dec 2012. Two of us will be on Langley a month from now and appreciate this timely post. Any other pictures? any needed? or just go straight up, literally a bee-line?

Thanks , Harvey

Harvey,pick your way up the sandy path / scramble from the big square boulder over to the right of the first evil pillar about maybe a soccer field away (?) in the flat sand just at the base of Langley. You will know the one when you see it - it sits alone and you will see a path leading there.

I don't have a photo of it...sorry

Tracie

I think they are looking at establishing a maintained trail to the summit of Langley. It's all part of the Wilderness Stewardship Plan. The time to comment is now:

http://parkplanning.nps.gov/document.cfm?parkID=342&projectID=33225&documentID=59967

I think the ultra mega cairns are for when there is deep snow. They seem pretty over the top for this year.

HJ

Good to know. A good maintained trail would be a positive step, and an environmental positive. The trail they are (already) building uses idiotic routing, IMHO, and currently is far more dangerous, again IMHO, than the other option Tracie and I have been discussing.

I looked at the link. While the proposal includes trail building, it does not mention Langley per se in that regard. The only mentions of Langley relate to limiting the size of groups that visit it.

Meanwhile, the trailbuilding that we observed is happening NOW. There is a permanent sign now erected asking people to respect the cairns and not build new ones to avoid creating confusion. We saw trailbuilding equipment stashed in a pit near one of the megacairns. And we saw evidence of actual trailbuilding, beyond the megacairns. All that leads me to think that the effort is independent of the Wilderness Stewardship Plan.

I tried calling SEKI to ask about this, but their phones are not working. I am going to resort to email.

I think it's a dumb idea and a waste of resources.

Directions to Mt. Langley:

1. Hike to the pass of your choice (Army, New Army, etc.).

2. Head north.

Oh, as Tracie said, we saw a single big horn sheep.



Friend of mine took the picture.

I think it is somehow related to SEKI planning. In the Wilderness Stewartship Plan they have a 1.45 mile Class 1 trail to the summit of Langley listed. The south side of Langley is also listed as a route or destination of concern where the park staff will attempt to make observations and to detect undesirable changes to prompt management action.

All the routes they have concerns about:
 High Route (Milestone Basin to Tablelands section)
 Lamarck Col/Darwin Bench
 Miter Basin-Crabtree
 Roper’s Route
 Silliman Creek
 South Side Mt Langley
 Tableland Divide

It is in Section 18 - Trail Management of the Plan

I'd guess we will see more restrictions in some of these areas and with that might come some awful overly engineered trails with excessive switchbacks, big steps, and rubble. Unfortunately the efforts to minimize impact sometimes makes matters worse because people just walk outside these crazy trails.

This is a good time to speak up as the plan is open for comments.

My friend was so nice as to let me graphically re-live the horror that is SEKI's "official" routing with the megacairns.

(SEKI, are you listening? I sent you email about this! After I could not get through on your phones! Why do you not write or call me back? I feel jilted and unloved!)

Anyway, so that others can share the pain, here is a graphic of the nutsiness. Bad route on the left, good route on the right. We're only talking about the stuff AFTER the sandy wash that cuts left to right across the picture.



The routing confirms that, at some point, we veered more to the left (NE) than optimal on the summit plateau (this was after the crux of the climb). I recall that this is the point that we decided to ditch the megacairns. Ironically, it appears that the megacairns started to reflect reasonable routing at the point that we ditched them.

I just received a thoughtful response from SEKI. See below. From the response, I suspect that the class 3 chute that we encountered while following the cairns is subject to additional "rock work" since it appears from the letter that (unsurprisingly) SEKI does not intend to send folks through terrain with exposure.

At least when we were on Langley on July 5, there was a disconnect between HQ's understanding of the situation on Langley and the reality. Maybe it is fixed now, but it was not the case that: "There is no more exposure than would be typical on the New Army Pass trail or on the Mount Whitney trail. There is one section, at the sand flat, where hikers need to step carefully onto some boulders, but there is no exposure below that section." Ha ha!

I still think the proposed routing is a mistake (even when fixed). In terms of environmental impacts, the routing to the summit block they are choosing to encourage is less direct and more difficult, such that many folks will ignore it and continue going the more direct route, which means more environmental impact on the mountain and continuing competing use trails.

Overall, though, I appreciate the thoughtfulness of the response.

***

July 15, 2014

Thank you for sharing your experience and concerns about the Mount Langley route-marking project in Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks.

The web of hiker-created (social) trails present on Mount Langley has been a wilderness stewardship concern since the early 2000s. These ad hoc hiker-created trails are causing adverse natural resource impacts--accelerating soil erosion and reducing alpine vegetative cover in designated critical habitat for the endangered Sierra Nevada bighorn sheep. In 2008, over ten miles of hiker-created trails were documented on what should be approximately a two-mile route, and the situation was described as a significant resource protection problem.

In 2011, we temporarily reduced the group size limit on the summit of Mount Langley from 15 to 8, initiated formal planning following National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) compliance requirements to address resource impact concerns, and identified a fund source to implement the project. During the planning phase, we considered but dismissed an option to implement a permit system, similar to the one for Mount Whitney, which would significantly limit recreational opportunities. We developed alternatives and evaluated the ability of each alternative to prevent further damage to the natural quality of the area while also providing opportunities for solitude and primitive and unconfined recreation. In 2014, we completed a minimum requirements analysis as required by the Wilderness Act. The selected alternative involves marking a single route, obliterating key social trails to restore the landscape, and communicating the project to the public. Note that the marked route is not a designated trail and involves little to no trail construction or maintenance.

The decision as to whether or not to construct and maintain a trail to the summit will be made in the parks’ Wilderness Stewardship Plan (WSP). In the interim, this action is the minimum required to protect park resources and wilderness character, and can be reversed if a different decision is made in the WSP. The Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks Wilderness Stewardship Plan and Draft Environmental Impact Statement are available for public comment until August 25, 2014. We encourage you to let us know what you would ultimately like to experience on your hike up to Mt Langley and elsewhere in the parks wilderness by commenting at: http://parkplanning.nps.gov/sekiwild.

The marked route was chosen by an interdisciplinary group after site visits in 2013, based on the following criteria:

It overlaps an existing social trail;
It is in an area expected to have early snow melt so that hikers will not continue to create new routes around snow fields;
It crosses landscape features in a way that least impacts natural resources;
It is navigable by hikers; and
It requires minimal marking of the route.

The selected route has the most gradual grade, crosses the boulder field in its shortest and least steep section, and circumnavigates the steepest, rockiest part of the mountain that requires some climbing. There is no more exposure than would be typical on the New Army Pass trail or on the Mount Whitney trail. There is one section, at the sand flat, where hikers need to step carefully onto some boulders, but there is no exposure below that section. The cairns are large so that relatively few can be used and still be visible from cairn to cairn, particularly when there is still snow on site.

Other than a short 100-foot section of rock work to create a more viable and visible route through the boulder field, and other than defining key turns in the route by using minor benching and rock-placement techniques in very limited areas, there is no trail construction taking place. Tools are on site for obliterating the social trails and restoring slopes to more natural conditions. I am attaching a map to this email which shows the marked route and the hiker-created trails in the area.

Mount Langley is clearly a very popular and much-visited destination. While we hope these efforts will encourage hikers to use the marked route in order to protect fragile alpine plants and soil, off-trail hiking opportunities have not been eliminated. Hikers will still have the freedom to make individual decisions on which route to take to the summit.

Thank you for your comments and interest in this important project. We are currently in the process of creating outreach materials to inform the public of the purpose of this project, and I regret that we were not able to get that information to you in advance of your hike.

Sincerely,


Kevin Hendricks

Chief Park Ranger

Thanks for posting SEKI's reply.

SEKI has a difficult job in providing a hiking route thru endangered Sierra Nevada bighorn sheep territory. And since this species is endangered, we should appreciate the fact that, at least for those of us dayhiking, we can do Langely without a permit.

I've done Langley many times, using (for me) optimal routes and some (with others) not so optimal routes. I'm sure whatever SEKI builds will not be optimal for some - look at how many shortcuts there are on Whitney - but the next time I'm on Langely I plan to use their trail. Not that I'm a "goody two-shoes" - rather, I know how fragile the soil is in the last mile, and anything I can do to minimize the impact on those bighorns I'll try to do. It is, afterall, their home. I'm only a visitor for a few hours each year.

Yes, I too applaud the spirit and intent behind the NPS action. The execution in its current form may be problematic. Well, NPS is listening so here's hoping it gets better.

My experience has been that a great many so-called "hiker use trails" are actually game trails, sometimes further defined by human use, sometimes not. I wonder how many of those 10 miles of extraneous trails were actually created by the very species they're hoping to protect?

That's an interesting point. A lot of the trails up there (in the huge open spaces extending from NAP to Langley and then up to the summit) have boot prints and cairns. The sand up there shows/preserves evidence of human impact pretty well. That's why, overall, I am sympathetic to what SEKI is trying to do.

There are many times in forest and meadow where that is true. In alpine areas of dispersed feeding where there are no restrictions to travel (for bighorn sheep) and no other factors concentrating travel (like rare water sources, food concentrations or geographical restrictions like passes) the bighorn sheep do a good job of grazing while walking in a scattered pattern. That is recognized as one of their adaptations for surviving in areas of limited and scattered resources and generates few trails.

Dale B. Dalrymple

Heres a map showing the trail (not sure if that's where they are really building it). http://parkplanning.nps.gov/showFile.cfm?projectID=33225&MIMEType=application%252Fpdf&filename=WSP%20Fact%20Sheet%20Mount%20Whitney%20Management%20Area%2Epdf&sfid=186502

Permits for day hikers are on the agenda.

I hope everyone made their comments before they closed the comment period.

This picture shows my hiking partner at one of the cairns. Some of them were so obviously placed, especially the two lowest ones, that I don't see how they were of any use. As you can see, the areas below this cairn and route is wide open and obvious, snow or not, so much so that there is only one informal trail. Furthermore, in the event of fog, the cairns are so far apart that they would, again, be useless.

Far more importantly, cairns higher up were not spaced close enough together. Going DOWN, one can spot the next one way far away, but going UP, you cannot pick out the next higher cairn out of the rocks on the skyline. I would show a picture of that, except you cannot see it!

I told this to a trail crew working there. They responded that choosing the right spot required all sorts of surveys, environmental impact studies, Acts of Congress or God. They planned to place one more, but not where I recommended.

I agree with others comments: right idea but practical implementation has problems.

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