Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board How Much Water

Generalities are a funny thing. I myself would probably consume about 5 liters + on a hike like this, mostly from the stand point that I drink water liberally to begin with. I suppose if I really felt like it, I could get away with packing just 2 liters and topping off at trail camp going up and coming back down. I used just water purification tablets on the water from trail camp and did just fine. And this was back in August 11ish from last year. It was rather toasty as you got lower near the portal.

Only a fool would change his or her drinking practices on the basis of a single newspaper article. However, 60 seconds with Google provides a lot of good information, both "old" and new , on sampling techniques, etc.

I ran out of water on the MR on the 18th of this month and since Iceberg Lake was frozen solid (could not break a hole with the axe), I had to resort to drinking from a tiny stream of water trickling down a rock. I slurped what I could not caring about the debris and moss. I felt like the guy from "Man vs Wild." Nonetheless, I never got sick.

Tina -- Maybe you never got sick, but did you develop an English accent?

The dude from "Man vs. Wild" (my girlfriend thinks he's "dreamy"...) would have probably chopped a hole in the ice..dove in and caught a fish with his mouth..then stripped naked and wrapped himself in the fish skin after eating it raw. All, of course, while glissading down to the Portal using his..ahem..tool as an ice axe...

Oh..and just to keep this on topic..(at least for the forum)..I flew into Oakland today (am here right now) and took some pictures of the Sierras, Yosemite, Mono Lake, etc..as we descended into OAK..I'll post some pics later.. I think I saw Richard down there in Mammoth hobbling around...

Chris

If I were faced with the above two choices, I would find another water source!

Actually, I know what you mean and I as stated previously, Bob R. said it best. Drink smart.

Oh yeah, I also forgot to mention that on March 10th, I drank unfiltered water (not moving much there between the rocks) from Lone Pine Creek at the crossing @ LBSL. The next day I drank from another little stream just below our camp site at Whitney Ice Falls (a little stream over debris and mossy looking stuff). I also swallowed some ice chips while hacking away on Whitney Ice Falls. Nothing happened (well, except my cravings for Yorkshire pudding - you were right Alan)! I also ate some snow (which I may never do again since I was told by Rick Kent that he has noticed tiny worms in his nalgene after the snow had melted...ewwwww!) That makes me sick just thinking about it. I usually use coffee filters when preparing melted snow for drinking...they help eliminate much of the debris found in the white (not yellow) stuff.

I'll hope to be carrying a filter if I am ever in that situation. But how many times have you seen anything dead floating in a Sierra lake?

the rumor is: Rick Kent has a patent pending on his 'Easy to swallow and digest, snow protein.' ......heheHHhhhh

Rick's family is descended from either the camel or cactus. How do you think he gets away with doing his epics on one to two liters of water?

I definitely wouldn't follow his advice on how much to carry (that is unless you multiply by at least a factor of two or three).

Just a few thoughts on this water quality thing. I used to be totally neurotic about filtering all my water and never touching the intake and outtake tubes together. This fear was fed by the scare over giardias and the media selling water filters.

BoB R's water article really opened my eyes, and I started using my filter less and less. I began to wonder if the whole giardias danger was all hype, brought on by the forest service (to prevent others from blaming them if they got sick) and the water filter manufactures (wanting to sell water filters).

I settled down to the view that in general the water is better then most of us realize. Drinking smart and avoiding trail camp water still seems a good idea. I still filter water for my smaller children, who didn't grow up doing a lot of swimming in lakes and floating down canals and rivers.....hence would not have much natural immunity to things like what is found in water.

Two years ago we were following a route to Cirque Peak which comes up a hidden canyon off the Cotton wood pass trail. The fast flowing river down toward the cottonwood pass trail looked enticing but we were not close enough to drink from the stream until reaching the small basin above. Boy was I shocked to see the water flowing right through large cow pie manure piles up in the basin....probably left there by stock horses.

http://outdoors.webshots.com/photo/1385708118061435028FKosTg

I sure was glad I waited until we got to the stream following into the basin from above.

http://outdoors.webshots.com/photo/1385720109061435028yQrBMb

So what is the point. Drink smart and use a filter if you want to be extra careful. You don't always know where the water is coming from above if you haven't been there before. Take enough water because it is a real drag to run out and still have a long way to go.

Like many other responses, I believe that one should carry between three and four liters of water from Trail Camp to the summit and back. Remember, it is 10 miles roundtrip, with lots of climbing. Believe me, you will be thankful that you have it.

Michael T.

It was my turn to filter the water at High Lake. After filtering 6 liters with a ceramic filter, my buddy points out that was a dead mouse in the water about 10 feet to where I was. Greaaaaatttt.

This is a very interesting and educational thread. Thanks Bob R. and others for sharing your incredible knowledge on the subject. Using commonsense is probably a piece of advise that nearly everybody would agree to. However, applying commonsense does not replace well founded knowledge. Until a few days ago commonsense would have meant to me: Don't drink water from lakes, go for the fast moving creeks. It turns out that is not necessarily true. Once at Iceberg Lake I actually broke that rule and scooped water directly from the lake into my canteen. The Lake was still about 75% frozen over. My reasoning at that time was, that water this cold would prevent any disease causing bugs from surviving. Health issues caused by poor water quality seem prevalent in warmer climates. Again, this conclusion is apparently wrong, since the time span that giardia cysts can survive is the longest in water barely above the freezing point. To me the discussed evidence is compelling that the risk of coming down with giardiasis is almost non-existent in the High Sierra. The chance of contracting a bacterial disease seems somewhat higher, especially in lower elevations and areas with or below stock animal populations.

Why is it anyways, that human presence is usually blamed for giardia in the wilderness. Should’ the occurrence of animals have the same effect, since so many species native to the High Sierra can also host giardia and their hygiene habits don’t match average human standards. They obviously don’t follow the rules imposed by the forest service concerning the management of their own waste. Is it because those critters rarely visit swimming pools and child care centers where giardia really exist and where they would get infected in the first place?

Kurt