Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Photo of 97 Switchbacks

Many of the regulars on this Board know I created a map of the 97 switchbacks a number of years ago. The map in Excel format, with all of the data used in creating the map, can be seen HERE. Thanks to BobR for his excellent consultation and making it available to everyone.

A jpeg version of the map can be seen  HERE  without the backup data.

Well, since I just learned how to label photos this past month (you can view my latest Lone Pine pano with peak labels HERE, I decided to label all of the switchbacks in a photo BobR shared with me some years back. It is the best photo I have ever seen of the switchbacks, taken from the notch south of Mt. Muir's summit near the trail switchback.



You can see the full version HERE.

The first seven switchbacks are hidden below the ridge between Trail Camp and switchback #8. Switchbacks #11 to #14 are not discernable, and switchbacks #37 to #41 are too close and lap over the ridgeline to be discernable.

One interesting thing to note is that an old switchback was rerouted many years ago. The v-cut can be seen to the right of switchback #92. Back then, before the current switchbacks #93 and #94 were made, there were only 95 switchbacks.

Were there ever exactly 99 switchbacks? That seems to be an enigma no one on this Board has been able to shed light on. One thing is for sure, Mount Whitney undergoes constant change, so it is just a matter of time(hope a long time!) before some part of the switchbacks will collapse and have to be rerouted.

thank you for taking the time to do this. i was there and was awfully curious how it all looked from above. this explains it all.

thanks again!

Great picture, Wayne! Thanks for working on it.

It is nice to view the picture in a browser. Just a tip: Once you click on the link and get the picture in your browser, clicking on the picture zooms in or out. When zoomed in to full size, you can use the browser's scroll bars to change the view.

Thanks, Bob, for your great photos and all your climbing and mountaineering. Like I said above, your photo is the best one I've ever seen of the 97 Switchbacks.

Thanks also for the clarification as to the exact location you took the photo.

That looks like a lot of work!

I'm always best off not being able to see the whole trail laid out before me like that. It looks just too hard. On long climbs I don't want to know how far it is.

But of course knowing that there are "only" 97 switchbacks instead of 99 it sounds pretty easy, right?

Thanks BobR and Wayne. That is a fantastic view of the 97 SBs. Thanks Wayne for the the GPS work showing the trail.

This picture is worth a thousand groans and points out exactly why I vastly prefer the switchbacks in the dark. Great picture. Thank you both for the collaboration.

Brent

Wayne-
Thanks, that's a great reference.

I am going to throw out a question to anyone on this board. Take a look at switchback #90 (best seen with your photo blown up.) Notice how the trail from the bend of switchback #90 appears to extend down towards the snow chute (to the right, on the photo.) Any guesses as to what this trail was? Was it an earlier version of the switchbacks? Or was it intended to be a path to the snow chute? (This seems unlikely, because the time my brother and I came down the snow chute as a short cut, we accessed it from the very top, not from halfway down.)

I took a group down the snow chute one time and they were so nervous we ended up traversing back to the switchbacks, probably about that point. I'd doubt that's the purpose of that trail, though. Also notice how it appears to pick up again across the rib between the two chutes and continue towards the face of the escarpment.

Also visible near switchback 17 is a trace heading below the cables towards the chute. I thought that trail left the main trail farther down. Guess I was wrong.

mrkdrt, you missed a couple...

Florence Peak is off to the left of your photo. What you label as Florence is probably Rainbow Mountain. What you show for Larson Peak is Lion Rock. Larson Peak is the rightmost peak inside your bracket for the Kaweahs.