Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Approx. hiking time

Last year when attempting a summit via the MR, I got as far as the "seep" and for a variety of reasons had to forego the summit attempt. Could someone on the board give me an estimation of the amount of time it would take an "average" person (not a "superhiker") to get to the summit from the "seep". Thank you very much.

What do you mean by the "seep." I am not familiar with that term. What elevation is it? What lake is it closest to?

The "seep" is the area just below Iceberg Lake where the water "seeps" through the long rock wall. Going through the "seep" is one of the ways to get up and over the rocks to Iceberg.

I've been up the MR just once a couple of years ago. I think the seep you refer to is a spot that others have referred to as a waterfall although it really is a seep. If my memory serves me correctly it is only a few minutes from this area to iceberg lake and then another 2 1/2 hours to the summit. Last time I was up we hit fresh snow at around 13,000' on the coulior. This made things a little slower and slick. At the notch we decided to do the traverse. It was also slick and slow but safer than climbing up the usual way since every hold had an inch or two of fresh snow. I believe it was the first weekend in October of 2004. Hope that helps.

Rafael...

Seriously, it all depends ... what time of year and what were the trail conditions when you did it before and what time of year are you going to do it again ? Are you doing it as a day hike and have a light pack or are you doing it as an overnight trip with a heavy pack ?? How long did take to get from the Portal to the "seep" ?? What is your experience and comfortable level with 3rd class climbing and possible crampon/ice axe usage ??

from the waterfall below Iceberg Lake it should just take 15 minutes to reach the lake once you carefully get above the waterfall. sorry I had never heard of it referred to as a "seep" before. since this usually the last "good" water to tank up with before the summit bid - people often querry regarding the water output at this source. when the water is frozen all or partial - it could be referred to as a trickle or seep.

as far as summit times from Iceberg Lake - depends on a variety of conditions incl snow, ice, conditioning, altitude acclimation, etc. - but I would figure 2-3 hours as average - maybe longer if any of these factors slow you down.

good luck on your next attempt - TC

Sorry I didn't realize where the seep was. Now that you have explained it, I know why you call it that. I have climbed up that way multiple times. It does seem to Ooz a little there.

I would agree with the times 15-20 minutes up to Iceberg lake and about 2.5 hours to the top.

Gotcha. According to Steve, UBB Threads only gives you one hour to delete a post. In addition, if somebody replies to your post with in the one hour, you cannot delete the post.

If you want to remove the information in a post, simply edit the post, delete the content, and add the words [message deleted by originator]. People should understand what that means.

Thank you for the followup Fred

I suspected the latter because someone posted a reply but I did not think of the one hour for guilty conscious retraction. I will edit occordingly.
Tomcat_rc

Thanks for your help everybody. My bad, I should've mentioned that I'll be going up in August. Thanks again and I appreciate your responses.