Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Trail Camp Day Hike - December 31, 2006

Since so many cars and trucks seemed to be able to make it up to the Portal without chains, I decided I'd save myself some walking by driving up too. (I do think that the warm weather will have drastically changed the road conditions to more icy.)

Unlike the day before, the wind was blowing on Sunday. It made it feel a bit colder, even though the weather forecasts had called for a warmer day.

I met five other climbers on the upper portion of this hike. All but two were participants on the board. One, who I met at Trail Camp (McClain?), was heading up for New Year's Eve on the summit.

The highlight of the day was the long conversation with a couple of Marines from Camp Pendelton who had aborted an attempt at Trail Camp. One was a good ol' boy from Tennessee. I could have listened to him talk all day long... loved the accent and reminded me of a real good friend from WV. Also revived memories of Chris with his comment about three summit "failures." I'd definitely be willing to help him make four a successful trip. (Being the studs that they are, they'd have to carry most of the load though.)

I found it humorous that they said they turned "white with fear, matching the color of the snow" at the "bulge" above Trailside Meadow. They mentioned the name of the tool that they used to cut a path, but I don't remember what they called it. Their work definitely made crossing that section safe.

I wished them good luck as they finally headed down.

Good memory on the spelling of my name! I also spent a good 20 minutes chatting with those two Marines, too bad they didn't have crampons and a little more time for they would have gotten the summit for sure.

My friend Hamik and I drove up sunday morning, stopping about a mile short of the portal just before the snow started (we didn't have chains or a 4wd). There were about 5 vehicles all the way at the portal, and we saw one couple out for a dayhike. We ran into Richard P on a "Rockwell variation" below the meadow and outpost camp, after passing the two marines lower down.

There was running water along the meadow, and a brief open stream higher up just below Mirror Lake, which looks lovely frozen! Our goal was trail camp, but we had started a little late and only made it to trailside meadow before stopping to set up camp before it got too dark and cold. [sorry r@ngers... but we tried to stay on the snow and minimize impact]

Again started a little late on monday, after spending too long melting snow We saw McClain around trail camp and then started up the switchbacks. Unfortunately Hamik lost a glove at this point and was feeling the altitude, so we decided if we weren't going to make the summit we might as well descend while the going was good. I walked up to the cables just to check them out, since I haven't actually been more than a few miles along the main trail before. Walked down, packed up, back to the car, Pizza Factory in LP, and drove back to LA last night. There were no vehicles at the portal when we left.

We had crampons and axes with us, though no need for the crampons at least up to the cables. As McClain mentioned in his post, no need for snowshoes at all. Occasional wind but not bad (at least below the crest).

Happy New Year to everyone!
-julian