Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Summit via East Buttress - June 14, 2009

A trip report with some route beta, as I was hungry for this type of stuff before our trip:
June 13-14 weekend, 2009

-Friday night: Got to Tuttle creek campground (a few miles up from Lone Pine off of Whitney Portal Road) @ 11pm

-Sat.:
*Interagency visitor's center (~1.5 mi. south of Lone Pine) @ 8am, got 1 overnight permit on the spot for the North Fork of Lone Pine Creek (already reserved the other permit earlier that week over the phone). The visitor's center has a bunch of climbing topos for the area, I suggest SuperTopo's "High Sierra Climbing" book (you can order the pdf online as well and just bring the pages your need) for the best approach and route beta. The nice man at the visitor's center photocopied a few pages from a book for us after we bought it.

* Had a hearty breakfast at the Whitney Portal Store (thanks guys! I even took my leftovers home with me and had them for breakfast on Monday morning)

* Did a warmup climb on the Whitney Portal Buttress

* Weighed our packs at the main trailhead: between 55-60 pounds each.

* Started the approach at 1:45pm on the shortcut trail, behind the boulders at the top of the Portal road's loop.

Note: Take the cairn marked path along the slab and stream coming out of LBSL, if you go up and left you'll see footprints, but you'll wind up in snow and it's much slower. The snow starts just before UBSL, on the first pass up to Iceburg, get your gaiters on, as you might post-hole.

* Got to Iceburg Lake around 8pm, just in time to get water from the lake before the hole that's been chipped out of it re-freezes for the night.

That night - we had a 3-season tent and 0 degree bags and were plenty warm , stuff in the tent iced up a bit but didn't freeze.

Sunday:
* Up at 4:50am, left camp at 5:30am to begin approach. Climbed up through the steep snow for about 30-45 min.

*Began East Buttress climb, the climbing was not too hard, although it does get runout, but it had some fun cracks, chimneys, and stemming sections. Some good exposure, but not too much. We didn't really follow the pitches in the book. There are spots where you could simulclimb, but there are good climbing sections on each pitch. 1 set of cams and a set of nuts was fine and a bunch of slings. I didn't wear gloves for belaying and the rock wasn't too cold, there also wasn't snow in the way on the route. I think we only roped for 5 pitches, because we stated up the alternate 5.6/5.8, and used pretty much the full 60m rope length for each pitch. After the last roped pitch we did 3rd/4th class scrambling without ropes, by going left around a block and down, then up a little ways through a hole to a wall, and then off left around the wall and around a corner, that might have had a cairn on it, to the summit.

*About 8 hours of climbing put us on the summit around 3pm. I felt like we were really efficient at belay stations and did not take breaks and climbed fairly quickly, but it still took us the high end of the range of time (4-8 hours) suggested in the book.

*After glissading down the MR got to camp around 4:40 and left about 6pm. Hiked down and was out of the woods by 9:30pm and then drove back and was home by 2am.

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Equipment notes: I could have used better (or at least ones made for winter weather) gaiters, boots and real snowpants, as my butt got pretty wet from the glissading, and my boots got wet from hiking through deep snow. Luckily I changed pants before the glissade, and kept my other pair dry for the hike back down.

Regarding glissading: For the North gulley of the MR, I was roped up and on belay so that I could try glissading, and be stopped by the rope if I got going to fast. When we realized I was in control, my partner followed without being on rope. The East gulley of the MR was fine for glissading, but you can still get going fast if you're not in control. Also, we were able to see other people glissading down the MR on our way up the East Buttress, and the guys at camp had glissaded down the day before, so we felt reasonably comfortable that it would be ok to do. However, had it been a colder or windier day (or previous night) and more cloudy, the MR might have been icier and a lot faster. There's also a 90 degree right turn about 400 feet down the North gulley. You don't want to miss that turn, b/c if you do, I think there's a cliff about 300' or so past where you should turn - a good reason to be really in control when glissading down that steep north gulley.

I think I ran into you guys at Ice Burg lake. I was one of the guys who was doing some self arrest practice in the MR chute on Sunday.

We summited on Monday via the Mountaineers route. The snow was a little firm for glissading, but some parts were fine for it. We had to avoid your previous tracks.

Did I read that right...you glissaded on the north face (final 400ft)? That seems really dangerous to me....

Hey Johnny,
How was the going up the chute on the MR? Crampons? Roped up?

that might have been you guys we saw on the way down. Yes - we glissaded down the north gulley (~400') of the MR. It does look super steep from the top - however, I went first, and was on belay so I practiced sliding and stopping myself with the safety of being on the rope. As long as you took it slow, you wouldn't go too fast. My partner then slid down without a rope, after realizing that it was possible to slide slowly and stop yourself when needed (after watching me).

The main chute up the MR was not too bad. If you get started from iceburg lake in the early morning the snow will still be frozen and you'll need your crampons. If you do it later in the morning the snow will soften up and you can get by without them, however I do not recommend even trying the final 400ft after the notch without crampons and an ice axe. The snow was way too unpredictable. We took the first chute and it was not too bad ascending. There was a cornice at the top which we had to climb over. That part was a little spooky. On the descent we took the 3rd or 4th chute because we saw more tracks on that route and thought it would be easier. This was far from true. The cornice was larger, there was much more ice and rock, and there was an avalanche break (or what I thought was one) that you had to climb over. We did not use a rope or anchors but there were points we thought it could be needed. There's not much run out for self arrest, nor is the snow the best for self arrest. You may want to bring a rope. You will NEED crampons and an axe.

I really hate reading about anyone glissading the north chute (above the notch), regardless of their experience level. This just isn't the place for a glissade, under any conditions, for anyone, in my opinion.

had the snow conditions been any different (icy, not as deep, etc), I think my partener would not have glissaded (I was on the rope). We sort of inched our way down, and didn't slide quickly at all. It almost looked scarier to walk down than to be inching along on your bum.