Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board This message board ROCKS!

Congratulations on your summit! I had the same experience. All the info I gleaned from this board made my experience awesome. I wrote a thank you too. As I summited i could not hold back the tears and cried for several minutes. I still smile every time I think about it. The experience changed and empowered my life and ignited a love of hiking into a passion.

Welcome to the club!

Norma R

DOCRDOG you totally said it all,lots of work and prep into this trip.My son(23) and I make our first hike this mon Aug 6. Having trouble sleeping already,girlfreind about ready to leave me over this,almost totally consuming,totally rambling now! Hope to meet some of you there I think Moosehead will be up.How will I know who she is,anything distinguishing about her? Thanks for all your help!!! If it was easy everyone would do it!

Scuba Sue- Way to go!!! I wouldhave had tears on my first summit, but the 55 mph freezing winds pretty much left me tearless by the time I got to the top. When I got down I got some funny looks when I walked into McDonalds-salt marks on my face from dried tears, hat hair and just plain wrung out!

I too had a weight problem until I STOPPED DIETING! I made up my own diet, eat your biggest meal as early as you can. I eat dinner betwn 3 & 4PM, don't eat much at all before bedtime, get off your butt and MOVE, buy some real jogging shoes. If you're coming back to Whitney (we all do!) help your body and heart by lessening the extra bulk it has to haul up. Getting up Whitney as overweight was a real accomplishment! You should be so proud!

Next one you do should be White Mtn, great conditioning trail! I'm loading my car now. See ya!

Scuba Sue-Congratulations on your summit and inspiring post!

I hope to summit in September and have been reading this message board for information and inspiration since I decided to enter the lottery for a permit. My mother reached the summmit in 1970 after taking my sister and me along with her on all of her training hikes, (San G, etc). After not hiking for about 30 years since (apparently "going behind a tree" was not something I cared to continue doing), I got back into it and have become a bit like my mother! (Imagine!). In preparation for the summit, I just spent 5 days backpacking up and over Kearsearge Pass and will be in Sequoia this week. For Whitney I will be spending two nights at the Portal campground and two on the mountain so I can best acclimatize. Maybe a bit much, but I want to take my time, get in touch with the mountain and enjoy the Sky Pilot!

Thanks again to all the experienced people who post on this board! You are very helpful to us newbies! See you in September!

Just a note to update those who posted on this thread:

I left Whitney Portal at 3:15am on August 24th and summited at 11am. And sure enough, there some tears in my eyes. I gave my friend (who had been waiting for me for over an hour) a high five, then I opened my can of beer!

This hike was a great experience! I enjoyed meeting others on the trail: the gentleman hiking solo who I met at Trail Crest; the San Jose man hiking with his 13 year old son; the Boy Scouts at the end of their eight-day trip; the group of four ladies that shared their grapes with me (those were the best tasting grapes I had ever had!); and finally: 82 year old Lois who summited with her sons. We all clapped for her as she approached the summit house.

I made it back to the Portal just before 7pm. Tired, kind of out of it mentally, but happy and satisfied.

Would I hike Whitney again! YES! In addition to hiking it again in one day, I would also like to do a multi-day hike so that I can take my time and enjoy an evening or two underneath those mountain peaks.

Thanks to all those who posted their encouragements on this thread, and to all those on the other threads who shared their experience, knowledge, and opinions. This message board really does ROCK!

Congratulations Beerdude. It is an emotional journey for some of us. Especially if there is an underlying motive and something to be proven to oneself.

Beerdude YOU ROCK!!!!