Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Cottonwood lakes in winter

Has anyone made it up to the cottonwood lakes area in the winter? I know the road gets closed about 13 miles below Horseshoe meadows, and was curious if walking up was the only option. I was considering some combination of biking & walking. Does anyone know if they always close the gate? Or can you drive up as far as is safe? Any info based on experience greatly apprceiated, Doug.

A while back Calhiker posted a picture up on the Horseshoe meadows road, behind the closed gate

Riding a bike would be possible, but you would need to be carefull about ***** ice and rock slides.

http://community.webshots.com/photo/31767028/53475464tbQEkJ

Hi Check our main page click on weather and then find the section that is Dwr ( STATE WATER WEATHER AND SNOW REPORTS ) then type in Cottonwood Lakes and a snow reporting station reports I think once a day and you can see depth of snow , also many cross country skiers visit the area so maybe check with Mammoth .com or the climbing guides in Bishop.Thanks Doug

You know that front page of our site has links to things I forgot about , campground, White Mountain weather reports, and more Thanks for getting me to check our front page!

Doug395, the site that Doug speaks is good. However, there is another site that I check out frequently. This site gives realtime reporting of snow and temperature readings for a wide range of areas. When you go to the site, do a find on Cottonwood Lakes. You can also look for Crabtree and Upper Tyndall Creek

http://cdec.water.ca.gov/misc/realStations.html