Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Google Earth - Mount Whitney

Has anyone else used Google Earth to view the Summit? After having done the MR for the first time in July, I have had a lot of hiking friends inquiring about the route, difficulty, etc. Although my pictures tell a decent story, the view of Whitney using the 360 degree rotation feature and zooming in on the chute above Iceberg Lake and the last class 3 climbing while simultaneously viewing my pictures of the same areas gives a perspective that is hard to match. It has given answers to questions that words were just not effective in explaining.

The perspectives you get by rotating and zooming in/out on the route from different views is incredible. It is as close to 3D as you could get. Of course, you have to know the route and the landmarks to really utilize the images. From an overhead perspective zoom in on Lone Pine and follow the road from Lone Pine to the Portal parking lot. the rest is finding the land marks along the route. When you get to Whitney zoom in and rotate the summit up towards you and use the 360 degree rotation feature to view the sides of the mountian. Very Cool!

Just thought I would share this tool with everyone.

Have a great day!

Every day before our Aug. trip via MR I would use Google Earth at my office to psych me up. But no computer generated image could have prepared me for the lack of oxygen, all the whining & groaning from my buddies less prepared, the raw hands and skinned knees, and the freakin awesomeness of the mountain. Simply incredible.

I highly recommend Google Earth. Summitted on September 22 for the first time. Checked out Google Earth before summitting which allowed me to "visualize" what I was up for. Read all the posts that I could to prepare me (also very highly recommend). And to see Google Earth again after summitting puts this all in a different perspective.

I used Google Earth preceeding my first trip to Whitney via the MR over this past Labor Day. Interesting is that the site updated the satellite photos between then and now. About eight weeks ago, the resolution was poor at best, could not make out the summit hut, Erbacher Ledges were not visible, Portal parking lot and trails were indistinct.
The current images are AMAZING. The tilt and zoom functions give fantastic views of the entire route. However, nothing beats actually being there to appreciate the scale and beauty.

Cool! I've been using Google Earth for some time as well and was hoping that one day they would have hi res imagery for the Whitney area. Previously it was useless but now it's awesome! Now I've gotta see how far the hi res stuff extends.

-Rick

Wow! From what I can see the hi res imagery now covers the whole of the Sierras! This has suddenly become an extraordinarily useful tool. While not a replacement for other maps the detail is quite exceptional. It's like a whole new world is now accessible at our fingertips. Cool stuff indeed.

-Rick

Thanks for letting us know that Google Earth updated their Whitney images. I looked at them weeks ago and they were so blurry, but now they look great.

I'm still looking for a good GPS track file of the MR if anyone has one to share.