Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board High Sierra Trail to Whitney

I completed the High Sierra Trail this past weekend, and took a lot of pictures, if it would be helpful to anyone, I have begun posting them on flickr here: oruwu: High Sierra Trail Set

As a brief trail conditions report, the rivers are extremely swollen (who would have guessed!?), snow covers most of the trail after the Kaweah Gap up to when you hit the river again, Precipice is completely frozen still. Guitar lake is accessible and snow free, and the end of the trail (the JMT) is very well maintained. Kern river is so flooded that we lost the trail for a couple hours and completely missed Kern Hot Springs.


I will write a much more detailed trip report hopefully in the next week, but until then, I will be uploading more pictures each evening.

Simply beautiful. Thank you for posting, looking forward to the rest of the photos.

Great pictures Speedy! Thanks for sharing them on the forum here. Looking forward to more details!

Absolutely beautiful photos. You're lucky you chose not to camp at Precipice Lake. It is not a very good place to camp. Looking forward to the next batch of photos!

We didn't have an accurate scale, but ~48-50 lbs (with water). They were 36 lbs (dry) at the end according to the scale at the Trailhead in WP.

We did pack moderately minimally, but probably could have done away with even more - always room for improvement, but I'd also say the pack weight was manageable for this duration of a trip.

Outstanding photos and scenery. Good job !

Some of the best scenery! I say the "uninvited guest" is
a prop! How'd you carry it up? Your photography is unbelievable!
Fantastik!

HN

Thanks for the pictures and report. We start our hike on 9 August and have been curious to get a full trip report. I really don't want to have to buy an ice ax. Here's hoping 3 weeks makes a difference in water levels.

Laurel,

Maybe I'll see you there! We're starting our HST hike August 6th, but we're planning real low-mile days (plan to finish on August 13th. ). I'm a short mid 20's brunette and will be with 2 tall guys and a blond girl, so say hello if you see us! :-)