Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board snowshoes in May?

Hi all. I will be heading up the main trail for an overnight on 5/7 to 5/9. We plan to acclimatize at the portal with undetermined day hikes prior. We are coming from NY to visit your beautiful area. The plan is to stay at Trail Camp. I was wondering if i needed to pack snowshoes, my msr accents, for any part of this trip. Barring any unexpected storms it seems the snow is well consolidated on the main trail and crampons seem sufficient enough. Any insight much appreciated.

One more question. I know bear canisters are not required till the end of May but I was wondering if I should still lug my canister out as a means of food storage or are there other, lighter strategies for keeping critters out high up.

Thanks for any responses.

We didn't need snowshoes at all just last week (see photos linked from the 4/17 & 4/18 trip report). Only post-holed a few times - mostly later in the afternoon and carrying the snowshoes would have been more work than worth. I'd suspect you'd still need to be prepared with ice axes and crampons in May for the portion of the route between Trail Camp and Trail Crest.

I don't think you need to worry about bears that early in May, but you may need protection from the marmots - they are persistent little guys with sharp teeth. There is an option to the bear canister (to me, it's not the weight but the bulk that I hate.) In Trail Camp, there's a wall to the left of the trail with lots of cracks. I'd take along one small piece of pro (a cam or hex nut) and hang a stuff sack with your food and scented items. That should be effective deterrence.

Have fun!

It's a bit further south, and a bit lower, but we saw fresh bear tracks in the Chimney Rock area over the weekend. It was enough for me to want to burn rubber boot tread once we hit the road getting back to our camp.

I would also think that as a good general rule, practice maximum bear precautions. Period. I don't think Doug wants another critter hanging out in the store this year.

-L

A couple of weeks ago I was at Whitney Portal doing a dayhike up the Whitney trail and asked another fellow there whether he thought it was worth moving food items from my vehicle to the bear lockers. He said emphatically yes, that he'd been in the Sierra backcountry many times this past winter and had been seeing them all winter long.

So ... I didn't happen to see any evidence of bears that particularly day, but this fellow seemed credible.

As an aside - I wonder whether there's a point in a vehicle's life when it's difficult to remove food smells. Leaving a locker or chest visible in a vehicle is one thing, but after a vehicle has 100K or 200K miles on it, is there any practical way of removing food smells from the upholstery? In any case, visiting an active bear area is a good excuse for spiffing up the old beaters, but I sometimes wonder if my efforts aren't a bit futile.

It seems to me that bears can discern between old beaters with old food spills and cars with an amount of food stored inside. Otherwise most old beaters would be peeled open by the bears.

Now that I think about it, even people can smell the difference between fresh food and stale food.

Forget the canister. Just keep your food well off the ground. Bears really are not something I worry about much below the tree line and not at all above.

If you leave anything out you will have fed a family a marmots for a year.

thanks for the suggestions, i'll keep my eye on the weather before heading out west and if it stays dry and the forecast looks good i won't bother with the snowshoes. and perhaps i'll just rent a cannister if that looks like the best thing. thanks again!