Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Overnighting at Iceberg

A group of 4 of us will be overnighting at Iceberg on the MR before attempting the summit of Whitney. We will have heavy packs 40ish lbs. Which do you think is better...

1. Packing everything to the top and taking the main trail down.

2. Leaving most of the gear at Iceberg and doing a light assent up , but have to come back down the same way to pick up our gear.

I feel like the 2nd is better, but people don't seem to like descending the notch on the MR route. The trip will be early June. We are all experienced hikers, but our first time on Whitney.

Thanks,

Depending on the experience of the group, I'd probably opt for the plan of leaving the packs at Iceburg and summit light. If snow is still in the chute(very possible in early June), it could be very slow going.Descending the MR is not as bad as it sounds and it's obviously faster.One concern could be descending the ledges with heavy packs. Again this depends on the experience of your team and how comfortable they are with the exposure. We've seen some groups carry a short piece of something like 7mm cordelette material to lower off the packs at the ledges.

Thanks for your input, good idea on bringing some rope. I like the idea of overnighting and getting an early summit. It would be nice to be at the top before the crowds, not that early June will be too crowded.

Lately it seems that people have not wanted to downclimb to the notch (partially for safety reasons). However, by June that is much less of a problem.

On one of my early trips to Mt. Whitney, we carried our trimmed down backpacks from Iceberg Lake over the top of Mt Whitney and down the regular trail. It was a long hard haul.

That is way harder and longer then just leaving overnight gear at Iceberg lake. Most do just that. Take a daypack to the top and back to Iceberg Lake. Then take a break packing up your stuff and return down the North Fork.

It is only worth taking all your gear to the top it if you want to climb Mount Muir and experience the regular Mt. Whitney trail on the way down.

40 lbs for a 2 day adventure?

also not sure if the concern is over the route safety (ice) or other reasons. Here is one of the others.

When I did the MR, I had knee-cartilage-on-descent-concerns and thought going up the MR and down the Main Trail would be easier. Was advised that the longer and faster speed pounding of the Main Trail would actually be worse. I had done the Main Trail before, so I took the advice. Left the gear on the way up MR, came back down the MR. Was indeed better (for me) on the knees, and more fun anyway. Hope this helps, Harvey

You can easily do the MR from Upper Boy Scout Lake -- If you are carrying heavy packs, I'd only take them that far. Much lower chance of AMS, too, so greater chance of enjoying the trip.

You're right Lankford, it may not be 40lbs. I'm usually climbing with the wife who's not so into hiking and I wind up carrying most of the gear. This Whitney trip without the wife will be lighter on the shoulders for sure.

Thanks, Kashcraft and Steve for the advice, the light ascent and return via MR sounds like the way to go.