Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Sky Blue Lake

When camping at Sky Blue Lake in summer months, what are typical conditions at night?

Last year I camped there one night in late September. As soon as it got dark, consistent gusts of wind became incredibly strong. They were so strong, that they literally picked up our 2-man tent (we didn't bring the stakes) with us in it, bent the poles, and we forever lost the ground cloth that was underneath us. And it was like this all night long, which meant no sleep.

Is this typical, or is it out of the ordinary?

When I was at Sky Blue Lake in early July a few years ago, it was warm, nice and sunny....pleasant evenings all three nights. Then again that trip had perfect weather the whole time we were gone.... My next trip up in the area it rained the whole time.

Last year the two of us were there in late June. We spent one night, and there was no wind at all, but it did get below freezing. Great fishing here. The only bad part was the boulder field after the pass going down to Upper Crabtree Lake.

Having camped at Sky Blue Lake, Meysan Lake, Iceberg lake over the years I would make this observation. Sometimes the weather is perfect with minimal wind....sometimes it is cold windy and raining up high. Many of our trips camping at 12000 feet (Sky blue lake is about 11545) it has been perfect...clear, warm, sunny, with minimal wind. Night temperatures often dip down to cold enough to freeze the small ponds, even in the summer. I have also spent cold nights during the summer that high with wind, rain and even snow (Iceberg lake 12600 feet).

Certainly September would be much colder then the heart of the summer. The time I camped at Sky Blue lake (1st week of July) it was nice and sunny with cool nights.. I don't really remember any wind.

You may have picked an especially windy and cold time when you were there...right after or before a storm. It is not always that way.

Hikern8,
last September we stayed one night at Soldier Lake and one night at Upper Crabtree Lake, both in the same general area of Sky Blue Lake. It was cool at night, probably in the high 30's or low 40's and we did not get much wind. but in the Sierra you never know! In June we did a moonlight hike up the Main Trail and it was windy all night long.

It rarely rains in the Sierra at night during the summer. Usually there's a little downhill wind around sunset that settles after dark. Overnight temps will get down into the 30's at 12K and up to the 60's during the day, with afternoon thundderstorms possible.

That said, after hyping the wonderful weather to my east coast buddies and even suggesting that we didn't need to bring tents on our 7-day peak-bagging trip into the Rock Creek drainage in mid-September, we got squarely nailed by the leftovers from a hurricane. We had all-night rain, snow, hail, thunder and lightning, high winds, ice plates on the insides of the tents, you name it. We got some preciptitation every day during that trip. Good thing they ignored me about that tent thing.