Mt. Shasta, 8-21-10 to 8-22-10

I've been a member of the Sacramento Hiking Meetup Group for quite a few years now. In fact, if it hadn't been for the group, I wouldn't have gotten the hiking experience I have now. It was with the group that I finished the Tahoe Rim Trail in 2007 and 2008, and learned about how rich in backcountry locations our area of Northern California is.

Since training for races and building up to the marathon the past few years, I haven't been hiking near as often. In fact, last year, I didn't do any hikes with the group at all. Imagine my surprise when I got an email from Meetup stating that not only was Mike Brinkley, a longtime member of the group, had become organizer, but that he was organizing a Mt. Shasta climb! I signed up for it that day and emailed Mike, telling him I felt the group couldn't be in better hands.

Mike takes great care in making sure the people in the back of the group make it home safely, whether he's an organizer or not, and in my early days in the group, that was me all the way. Sure, I'd lost weight, and was in the process of getting into shape, but I certainly had a long way to go. This meant spending a lot of time in the back, and also meant, spending a good amount of time hiking with Mike.

That was then, however, and this is now. As luck would have it, I'm in better shape now, and there was a Shasta climb to prepare for. In getting ready for Shasta, I repeated one of the TRT hikes, and climbed to a few peaks with the group ahead of time for conditioning purposes.

Day 1: Helen Lake
The first order of business was obtaining the gear. While I've done quite a bit of hiking, I've rarely encountered winter conditions. My boots can't take crampons and really aren't designed for that sort of terrain. Most of the others in our group were in the same boat, so we stopped at Fifth Season in Shasta City to pick up boots, crampons, ice axes, and helmets. From there, we went to eat breakfast at the Black Bear.


Brian, Ingrid, Holley, and Rini at the Black Bear Diner

The Black Bear is known for its ample portion sizes. Thanks to California law, they're required to provide nutritional information about their food; that doesn't mean they have to like it. In the nutritional guide, it talks about their reputation, and how some people feel their portions are too large and should therefore bring home leftovers. Right next to the normal statement, "Based on a 2000 calorie per day diet" is the listing for their dinners, each of which weigh at more than 2000 calories apiece.

I opted for the 7-grain pancakes, lots of good carbs in preparation for the weekend ahead.



It really was work trying to get down just the pancakes alone. I also managed a piece of bacon and the egg, but didn't touch the sausage.



After breakfast, we drove the 20 miles or so to the trailhead, got our permits, geared up, and started off. To start, the trail wasn't all that bad, mostly flat, certainly nothing strenuous.



I'm sure this was by design, for the first 1.7 miles were to a cabin that's owned and maintained by the Sierra Club, at a location known as Horse Camp. Camping in the cabin is against the rules, but it can be used in winter months as a shelter against the elements. A resident caretaker has a tent nearby and is there to maintain it, as well as act as an informational guide to visitors. A $2 fee is requested if the facilities are used, including a natural spring for refilling water, and a non-chemical, natural bathroom.



If I had any complaints about the cabin, it's that it was too close to the trailhead. It did, however, give us a chance to take care of any developing blisters that could be a problem (I had none) and get some guaranteed-fresh water for the trip up the mountain.

Directly behind the cabin is a 1-mile stretch of stones known as Olberman's Causeway. The first caretaker of the cabin decided that it would be better to have a walkway to protect the surrounding natural environment, so he built it out of large stones. There are now signs that tell visitors to stay on the causeway, rather than walk on the ground itself.



There was a small incline, but not too bad; however, at the end of the causeway, we were reminded of where we are, and why: it was time to climb.



That image is actually looking back in the direction we came from, about 3/4 of a mile from the edge of the causeway. The higher we got, the steeper the trail got, and the less the trail builders felt like building switchbacks. It was almost as if they decided that hey, if they were working that hard building the trail, the people hiking the trail should work just as hard getting to the same place.



The temperature was dropping rapidly as well. I also made the mistake of hiking with the same shirt I'd worn up to the mountain, a cotton, Avenue of the Giants Marathon shirt that was comfortable, but nonetheless not intended for doing strenuous exercise in. My sweat-covered back did nothing but get cold in the drenched shirt, so I finally had to change into a long sleeve compression. This was more like it, so it was time to get into gear and continue the climb.



At the top of the crest, it appeared we had made it to Helen Lake, our Day 1 destination. There were a few tents, and a large group of people gathered. Come to find out, this wasn't our destination, which would turn out to be another few thousand feet up. I took the opportunity to put on some gloves and a jacket.



Between that crest and the ascent to Helen Lake was a talus field. With the sun now completely down and darkness rapidly ascending, I put on my headlamp, but wasn't able to find a trail. I knew where we were headed, and Ingrid wasn't far ahead, so I basically followed her to the top.

We finally reached Helen Lake at 9pm. I set up my camp as quickly as I could, ate dinner, and got to bed in order to rest up for the coming day.

Day 2: To Infinity And Beyond!
Before we all gathered for breakfast the day before, Mike made mention that we would be leaving at first light. At 2:30 in the morning, I heard some people leaving for the summit, but my head was pounding, so I went back to bed. At 6, I heard Ingrid asking if anyone was getting up, but it sounded to me as if she was asking for Jello. Again, I went back to sleep.

At 7, I stumbled out of my sleeping bag to find a place to go to the bathroom.



The fog rolling across camp was beautiful! I do wish I could have seen the camp in the daylight the night before, but that's alright. I took a few minutes to look around before using the facilities.



Once I'd done that, I went off to find my fortune, which provided me the opportunity to use a Wag Bag. If you haven't heard of it, it's a method of going poop without leaving the poop behind. That's right, you pack it out. The version I was carrying came from Mt. Whitney, and the idea is you poop into a bag filled with scented kitty litter, tie it off, then put it into a second, thicker ziplock bag to hold in the freshness. You then carry it with you and leave it in a recepticle at the trailhead.

So off I went. Every time I bent over, my head would start to pound, and I was starting to worry that at approximately 10,000 feet, I'd have to give up due to elevation sickness. I told Mike about it, but went on with the thought that if things got too bad, I'd just head back. I packed my daypack with the layers I expected to use, as well as some food.

As we were getting ready, a ranger gave us a quick tutorial on glissading and self arrest. We put on the crampons, mounted our helmets, and with ice axe in hand, I was ready to start the ascent, getting started almost right at 9am.



This was completely different than the day before. The clouds would roll in and out, going back and forth between warm, direct sunlight, causing us to remove layers, and cold fogginess, causing us to put them back on. This made the already slow going even slower.



Even though it was annoying having to remove our layers and put them back on repeatedly, there was no denying the beauty of our surroundings. It even made climbing a little less annoying.





With all the climbing, a few people had leg cramps. Here, Robyn (who met us at camp) was sitting down, tending to blisters, and resting from her cramps.



To show how slow going it was, here's a quick video I took with my iPhone.







As we reached the bottom of the Red Bank, we hit the steepest portion of the snow. It was almost twice as steep as it was before, to the point where the only way to climb was to pick my axe in, pull myself up, rinse and repeat. We did this for about a half hour, when I looked at my watch and saw that it was 2pm.

I quickly calculated that we probably wouldn't make it home at a decent hour unless we turned around. I told Mike what time it was, and he immediately knew what I was getting at. We started discussing the situation. A few people wanted to summit anyway, so they went ahead. Mike, Brian, myself, Ingrid, and Rini all felt we should turn around. We decided to at least climb to the top of Red Bank, rest a moment, then turn around.

Once at the top, it was only a few minutes before we saw the other members of our group heading back down from the top. One person was actually running down the last hill! There was just not enough time for the rest of us to summit and come back down. We turned around, positive in that we didn't turn around due to not physically being able to summit, we turned around because of time.

The last steep portion was quite daunting to go down. We sat for a very long time just staring at it, wondering if we should even attempt it. Earlier, another group was heading down as we were coming up, but they weren't glissading as we were considering; they were climbing down with crampons and a rope.



The steep portion wasn't really all that long. You can see in the picture that the chute going down the mountain actually turned through some rocks. The rocks weren't so much the concern, the concern was slamming into them headfirst!

We looked for a while longer when the guy who had run down the hill at the top decided to go for it and just slid right down. Brian went next, followed by Ingrid, so I decided to follow. I was pretty scared, so I kept using the axe to stop myself as I went down. When I passed Brian and Ingrid, they weren't glissading, but climbing down backwards using their axes and crampons as they went. I decided to keep trying however slowly and glissade past the most steep portion.

Once at the bottom, some people we had talked to on the way up were at the bottom of the steeper portion, while two other members of their group were at the top. They were trying to get the attention of the other members, wanting them to hurry up so they could get to the bottom. As Mike started coming down the chute, Brian came down and joined me where I had stopped.

The two guys from the other group started heading up, and it was obvious they were in phenomenal shape. They were ascending the steep part of the chute 3 times faster than we had been earlier! Amazing.

Brian and I were waiting for Ingrid and Mike to come down the chute, but it wasn't happening. 20, 30, 40 minutes passed with nary a word, so I shouted up to Mike, asking what was going on. This is where luck and coincidence sort of conspired together.

Mike shouted down, saying Ingrid was in bad shape. She had a touch of hypothermia, her fingers were turning purple, and she couldn't stop shivering. As luck would have it, the two guys who had headed back up towards the rest of their team were volunteer first responders and could immediately tend to Ingrid! They worked on her for another hour or so to get her warm, and told Mike they would accompany her back down to Helen Lake.

Before Mike came down, a person came down the chute, saying, "Hi!" as she passed: it was Holley! She went by so fast she couldn't say anything else, and we saw her slide on down the mountain.

Mike came to us, told us Ingrid's situation, and satisfied that the first responders would be with her, we went down with Mike in the lead and Brian behind me.

This was an amusement ride like no other. While climbing up from Helen Lake took 6 to 8 hours, sliding down took less than an hour. There was little physical effort on my part, because gravity took over. The chute was already well defined from all the people sliding down prior, so all that was required now was to slow myself down if necessary, and enjoy the ride.

After about 20 minutes, I could see the camp. It still looked a long way away, and it really was. 20 minutes after that, I was at the bottom, had an icy rear end, cold fingers, but adrenaline flowing. Without a doubt, I didn't feel cold.

We went to our tents, and immediately I changed out of my cold, wet clothes and into the dry. As I started taking down camp, Ingrid and the first responders arrived. They told Mike that she needed to get into a sleeping bag for about a half hour, get warm liquids, and basically get her body warm.

Meanwhile, I kept tearing down my camp. It still took a long time, and by the time we were finished, it was 8pm and again, darkness was looming. By the time my pack was loaded, I had to wear my headlamp to see.

We came back down the way Ingrid and I had come up, a trail that led to the base of the talus. In the dark, we were able to follow the trail flags to a snow field. On the other side of the snow field was the trail that we had taken on the way up, which was different than the one we were on now.

At the edge of the snow field, we found the footprints of the people who had gone ahead of us, which led us to the trail. On the way down, we ran into Brian, Ingrid, and Rini, who had gone down ahead of us. Rini stayed with us, while Brian and Ingrid went ahead.

We took a break at the cabin and used the bathroom there once again. Once our Nalgene bottles were full at the spring, we went the rest of the way down to the trailhead. I got to my car at 10pm.

The drive back home was uneventful. I was exhausted and ended up sleeping at a rest stop for a few hours. Once home, I went to bed and slept until the afternoon.

Was it a great trip? Indeed, it was. Did I summit? Nope. Do I care? Not in the least bit. The mountain will be there, and there's already talk of organizing another trip earlier in the summer of 2011.

Visit my Flickr stream for the rest of the photos that didn't get put into the trip report, as well as view a Google Earth flyby of the climb. Enjoy!

It's taken me a week, but I've finally gotten around to writing a trip report for the last week's (not)Whitney trip. I can't believe how tough it's been to write this! Not putting it into words, but having the time to sit down and write it. Anyway, here we go.

To start, here's a TOPO map of the entire trip. If you click the image, it'll take you to its Flickr page, where you can see the full resolution image (2190x2282).


9-18-08, Day One: Getting There
We had originally wanted to get out of town by 10am, but Rob was busy doing last minute prep. That actually gave Bob and I a chance to pick up some last minute things of our own, so we made it to Rob's house by 11. Rob got home at almost noon and we ate a quick lunch while doing some extra route planning at his house. We also decided to cut the trip short by a day, returning on Friday rather than Saturday. I called the Inyo Reservation Line and had the permits changed.

The drive down was pretty pleasant. We were going to drive through Sacramento to 50, then across to 395, but in Sacramento we changed the plan and drove to Reno, then across. It would have likely been quicker to go Highway 20 to 80, but at that point we were already in Sacramento.

We made an obligatory Starbuck's stop in Reno. I'm not a coffee drinker, but both Bob & Rob are, so it was necessary for them. I understand, that's how I feel about my Diet Mt. Dew. It also gave us a chance to stretch our legs before the 120-mile or so drive ahead of us.

Once in Bridgeport, we fuelled up at this odd gas station that was suspicious of its customers. How do I know this? The picture gives it away.


We ate dinner at a place called Rhino's Bar & Grille. It was already cold outside! I had to dig my fleece out of the pack to get warm. Dinner was great, I had a chef's salad while Rob & Bob shared a steak.

We finally arrived at the motel in Lone Pine at 11:30. The guy at the Motel Mt. Whitney was very friendly and helpful, I don't think I've encountered someone like that in a locally-owned motel like that before. We all took the opportunity to shower and then hit the hay.


9-19-08, Day Two: Breakfast, Campgrounds, and Shuttles - oh, my!
I've been trying to figure out why, when on vacation or traveling I have no problem waking up at 5:30am, while on work days I can't seem to get myself out of bed. On the dot, my body woke up and refused to go back to sleep. I took the opportunity to take a few pictures with my Gorillapod.




When I came back, I quietly opened the door, being careful not to wake anyone up. Unfortunately for me, the sun was directly across from the door, and no amount of carefulness could stop it from blinding Rob. Needless to say, he woke up.

Once up and about, we left our packs and set off to find some food. The guy at the motel office recommended a place called the Alabama Hills Cafe for breakfast. It couldn't have been a better recommendation.


This place had great service, great food, and great prices. They had day-old bread that we were tempted to buy, but skipped on the grounds that we had enough food as it was. I think that was a good idea in the end.


Once fed, we made our way over to the Inyo National Forest Visitor Center & Ranger Station, where we converted our permit registration to real permits. They issued us a real permit, little orange tags to hang on our backpacks while in the Whitney Zone, and Wag Bags. What are wag bags, you ask?

Normally in the backcountry you dig a cathole, a hole 6 inches deep to follow nature's call with. The Whitney Zone is so popular that they've deemed it against National Forest rules to bury waste. You have to pack it out. A wag bag is a large plastic bag full of silicone that, when hit with moisture, turns into a gel. Think of what happens in a diaper, and that's what you have here. You then close up the large plastic bag and put it inside another, zip-close bag, and carry it with you. Yup, you pack out your poop. We also found out at this time that none of our overnight stays would be in the Whitney Zone, otherwise dubbed the Poop Zone.

Once we had our permits and were satisfied, we went back to the motel to check out, get our gear, and drive up to the campground. Not having a car with me, and needing someone to stay with our gear while they shuttled the cars, I stayed at the campground. I asked Bob to leave his tent there, so I could put it up and take a quick snooze while they were gone. Little did I know, it would take 3 hours for them to shuttle! So it was a good thing I set up the tent. Once they returned, Rob set his tent up as well.


Rob & Bob wanted to do a quick dayhike to see how far we'd have to hike to get a preview of some of the scenery we were heading towards. We pulled out our daypacks, our Nalgene bottles, and headed out.


We had a snack midway through, and at the Inyo Wilderness Sign (about 3.5 miles), we turned around. The National Geographic TOPO map shows that it was only 6.5 miles total, but the GPS read 7 miles when we got back.


For dinner we took a trial run with our stoves and cooked up soup, Mountain House dinner, and a Mountain House dessert. Everyone was stuffed and satisfied, and Rob had me read some camping-related scripture. That one was tough, I read a passage from James. The only reason was it referenced being in the wilderness. It worked though. Once in bed, I slept pretty well, although during the night I had one of my shout-out-loud dreams. I used the opportunity to walk to the bathroom, and to my surprise, the crescent moon was so bright I didn't need my headlamp. Rob said later that it was 34 degrees that night.

9-20-08, Day Three: Horseshoe Meadow to High Lake, 7.7 mi, +1752'


The next morning we broke camp, made sure everything was cleaned up, put our extra gear & clothes into Rob's car, and headed out. Of course, we had to stop for the obligatory trailhead shot. The Gorillapod came in handy again! If you notice, I'm wearing long sleeves. I brought long sleeve compression shirts, and surprisingly the long sleeves actually helped. Not only did my arms not get sunburned, but they felt cooler because I wasn't feeling the sun directly on them while the air was blowing through the shirt.


Of course, we had already seen the first 3.5 miles the previous day, so I didn't duplicate the photos. Just after the Inyo sign and just before the main elevation gain, we stopped for a snack.


Following the guidebook closely, at every trail junction we followed the signs for New Army Pass. New Army Pass was directly above High Lake, our destination for the day. The first lake we came across was the first of the Cottonwood Lakes, the unoriginally named Cottonwood Lake #1. This was our lunch spot.


Just beyond the Cottonwood Lakes, we hiked through a boulder field. Those aren't just small rocks, they're boulders the size of trucks.


To give you some idea of their size, Bob is on the left.


After hiking around the Cottonwood Lakes for an hour or so, we came out next to a creek and what looked like the most gorgeous campsite you would ever see. Being about 30 feet from the creek, that eliminated the possibility, but the Forest Service really wanted us to know that we shouldn't camp there. Fine, we won't camp there.


Instead, we camped a bit closer to the lake itself, in a campsite that was much better, in my opinion. There were plenty of rocks for cooking and gear storage, with a nice view of the approach to New Army Pass. Once we got set up, I decided to scope out a good position for some sunset photography. I don't think we could have asked for a better spot.


Rob & Bob decided to go for a swim, and called it their "bath". They tried to get me into the water, but that lake was COLD! Rob's watch read 45 degrees.


After the swim, we all ate dinner. As sunset approached, I climbed back onto my perch and took some pictures with the Gorillapod. At $50, barely weighing anything, this was probably my personal favorite gear of the trip. In the past I've carried my normal tripod that weighs at about 8 pounds, so believe me, I was quite thankful for the Gorilla!



Originally we had wanted to climb Cirque Peak, which we could see from our campsite. Unfortunately, the time we got there and all the camp chores necessary made it something we'd have to save for another time. That's okay. Here's a view of Cirque Peak, at sunset.


Being at over 11,000 feet, combined with lying on my belly to take the pictures really gave my head a good throbbing. I came back down around 8:30pm and pretty much went straight to bed. Rob tried to get me to stay up and visit, but my head just didn't want to cooperate. In the morning, I was extremely happy I went to bed early, since my headache was all but gone.

9-21-08, Day Four: High Lake to Mt. Langley to Upper Soldier Lake, 9 miles, +3104'


This was the day that really made us start to think that yeah, all the time and effort put into training was coming in handy. Looking at the Google Earth rendering of our trail it's pretty clear: this day was all about the word "uphill".


The elevation gain was really divided in half. The first half was going up New Army Pass.


Heading up the pass, we could see back at our former campsite, High Lake, and the Cottonwood Lakes.


After almost exactly one hour, we made it to the top of the pass.


The views were incredible from up there! You could see Mt. Langley, Mt. Muir, Mt. Whitney, and others. Langley was an imposing figure, to be sure. As I found out early on with my Canon 10D, my wide angle lens isn't really all that wide when used on a DSLR with an APS-sized sensor. So what can a guy do? A panorama in Photoshop, of course! Make sure to click on this image, View All Sizes, and view the actual size of this one. Mt. Langley is on the right.


We spent a good half hour exploring New Army Pass. We could easily have spent a few hours up there.


After gearing back up, we headed towards Mt. Langley, which became the second half of our elevation gain for the day.


Per our guidebook, we followed the New Army Pass trail until we saw a wash, which we followed around to a use trail that headed towards Langley. Along the way we came across two fellow hikers who were descending the mountain, and gave us some idea of what to expect. Basically there is no official trail going up to Langley, but there are hundreds of use trails. The use trails get created because really the mountain leading up to the peak is scree, which moves and slides as people walk on it. The trails reminded me of footpaths in slow, coming and going with time. We left our packs behind a large boulder, filled our daypacks with lunch and water, and headed up. I managed to attach the 10D to the pack via a few carbiners, leaving the bag to bounce as I hiked. It wasn't going to be a very long hike, so I figured it'd be okay.

After spending what seemed an eternity climbing up the steep scree slope, we scaled what amounted to 1/4 mile of boulders to reach the summit. Bob found it first, and when we got to the top, he was sitting right on top of the marker. Rob also had to stand on top of the marker, but I was happy with sitting on it.


I set up the camera on the Gorillapod, used the remote trigger, got myself onto the rock and, *SNAP*, we had our hero shot.


Once again, the views from the top were incredible. From this angle, we could easily see Muir & Whitney, our destination for the next day. Whitney is the highest peak in view.


I couldn't resist the temptation and lie down on my stomach, pointing the camera off the edge, for a view down the cliff. This doesn't do it justice.


I also couldn't resist this one. I put the GPS next to the marker and took a picture of them together. The Garmin was 28 feet off from the marker's elevation. Which one was inaccurate? Who knows.


Here's a good rendition of our ascent from the opposite (cliff) side of Langley, looking back at the path.


On the way back down, I noticed the camera bag was starting to bounce and hit my legs as I hiked. This was a little strange, since it was supposed to be up by my back, so I adjusted the straps and continued on. At one point Rob was behind me and said hey, your pack's open. Of course, I had zipped it up at the top. What happened was the weight of the camera pulled down, causing the zipper to come undone and just open up. Rob caught it as my cell phone landed on the ground, but guess what was missing from the pack?

The Gorillapod. My favorite piece of gear from the trip had been lost somewhere in the quarter-mile descent from the peak! Using the GPS to backtrack, I had hoped to find it somewhere along the line, but it was obvious once I got back to the peak itself that it was gone. *snif*

Back at the boulder, we took a quick snack & water break, geared back up, and made the descent down to Upper Soldier Lake. Once again, it was a gruelling trip, only this time downhill. According to National Geographic TOPO, the elevation loss was 3404', which was more than our gain for the day.


At Upper Soldier Lake, we were treated to a campsite that was better than even the last one. We were back at a lower elevation, so we had TREES! The lake was surrounded by a beautiful marsh and the site itself could probably have held an entire Boy Scout Troop. It was HUGE, with the Major General imposing above us. There was a wide view of the sky, which once darkness came, was full of stars. The site was so large it was almost like being on a private beach.


We set up camp quickly because we were losing light fast. I filled Rob's bucket with water and we had dinner. This night I stayed up quite a while longer, and we planned the next day, which was to be the day we would summit Whitney. Little did we know, this would not be the case.

9-22-08, Day Five: Upper Soldier Lake to just above Sky Blue Lake to Rock Creek, 8.5 miles, +1370', -1948'


Our morning was an extremely casual one because our goal was to get to Sky Blue Lake, climb the pass, and camp somewhere on the ridge. Mileage was to be short, about the distance of our trip to High Lake, at about 5 or 6 miles. We took our time eating breakfast, and afterwards I took a short hike alongside Upper Soldier Lake for some pictures. At that time of the morning, the lighting combined with the stillness of the lake made for some amazing reflections.



I hiked a little farther and got just above Lower Soldier Lake, which was only about a quarter mile away.


The Major General was impressive from here as well, and the shadows being created by the rising sun was beautiful.


Once our gear was loaded once again, we headed off, this time cross country. Basically we skirted the base of the Major General, then around the side. Once we rounded the bend, we caught a great view.


At the end of the bend, we needed to move towards an "unseen notch". What's an unseen notch? Actually it was just a notch in the landscape that we couldn't see until we were all the way around the bend. We had to climb down some rock and over the creek in order to get over there, where we found a use trail. The trail led up to a small tarn.


It was all beautiful country, but I think of all the areas we visited, the trip through the small canyon in the notch was my favorite.



At a certain point we kept finding what I can only describe as enormous steps. They weren't steps that you could climb, but it's always interesting to me how from a distance you can look at a mountain and see that instead of it being straight up, there are platforms as you travel. This one had probably 3 or 4 of these platforms. This was one of them.


As we hiked across what I described as a platform (really about 1/8 of a mile or so), we hiked along the creek, which was flowing down the length of the platform. Be sure to look at the larger version of this for the detail. Rob & Bob are hiking alongside the creek, which is forming a longish waterfall along the length of the trail.


At the top of this particular platform/shelf (it HAS to have a real name!) was Sky-Blue Lake. It really was blue. Really, really, really blue.


Someone had a tent among the rocks above the lake, so we hiked a bit further and found the perfect place for our lunch break.


Looking back towards the lake's outlet, you can see the dropoff where we climbed in.


Here's another view back to the outlet from the opposite side of Sky-Blue Lake.


Above Sky-Blue Lake, we were following the guidebook's instructions over Crabtree Pass, but things didn't quite add up. We actually had two versions of the guidebook ("Mount Whitney, The Complete Trailhead to Summit guide by Paul Richins"). While I don't have older version handy, I'll quote the new version.

"From Sky-Blue Lake's outlet, walk around the right (east and north) side and ascend alongside the lake's inlet stream, heading generally northwest and then angling west through beautiful meadows and past several small ponds. At a large glacial moraine and two potholes at 11,920 feet, the stream turns right (north). Follow the streambed over large boulders and talus to a tarn at 12,000 feet. At the upper end of this tarn and meadow, hike northeast up gradual terrain to the outlet of the large unnamed lake at 12,129 feet. From the outlet you can look down on Sky-Blue Lake and up to Crabtree Pass."

Right. We walked around the right side and ascended the inlet stream. We stayed northwest, then angled west. Our elevation changed, and we got to around 11,850 feet, but there was nothing. We were below 12,000 feet but certanly didn't see where there could be a tarn. Rob was telling us that we needed to ascend up back where we came from, so we headed back down a bit.

Back at our last turn, this was the only alternate route, not to the pass, but up to where we could see the pass.


If it looks like a cliff, that's because it is. We thought that maybe, just maybe, there was a trail leading up, so we dropped our packs while Bob went ahead to check it out. He started hiking, but as Rob and I watched, we saw him get down on all fours and start climbing. Bob wasn't wearing a pack and was still having some difficulty getting up.


There was no way Richins was talking about this! This was a cliff, but his wording never mentioned that word. In fact, earlier in the text he says, "It is an enjoyable hike to the pass, but it is over difficult terrain requiring a considerable amount of scrambling." Scrambling? Do you call this scrambling? Did he perhaps have a different defition of the word "scrambling"?


When Bob came down, he described it as high Class 2, maybe low Class 3. By the end of the trip he was calling it Class 4. In the end, we had to retreat and head towards Rock Creek, because we were losing light. Not only that, but we had lost the chance to summit Whitney the next day, and needed to make up as much mileage as we could to shorten the trip back the way we came, back to Rob's car. Shuttling Bob's truck to the Whitney Portal ended up being unnecessary. We made it to a good campsite just as the sun was setting. We had dinner, got lots of recovery drink and made it to bed after pouring over maps and the guidebooks. In the end, we all agreed that the place we were at before turning back towards the cliff was really the way we needed to go, and we were probably 2/10 of a mile from where we wanted to be. Hindsight is always everything, of course.


9-23-08, Day Six: Rock Creek to Army Pass to Horseshoe Meadow, 12 miles, +1721', -2345'


The next morning we awoke to frost on everything. My red backpack was reduced to a lame pink color seen through the frost.


The sun was slow at first, so Bob & Rob decided to climb to the sunlight to use the restroom. They ended up ascending what looked to be 70 or 80 feet! It was on the opposite side of the creek and up the hill.

The hike from Rock Creek down to the Army Pass Trail was pretty flat and much welcomed by me. Once we got close to the trail though, we started losing elevation quickly. On the Army Pass trail, we quickly gained the elevation back and then some as we approached the pass.


Once at the top of the pass it was much windier than New Army Pass had been the previous day. We could see New Army from where we were at, but when we came over the top, we saw our trail down. Army Pass is an unmaintained trail that's been bashed and beaten by rockslides for many, many years. And we were going down it!
Somehow I ended up leading the way. I refused to take pictures on the way down, I wanted to be focused on the task at hand.


Once at the the bottom we ran into an older gentleman on his way up. He didn't seem too worried about the pass, but we told him how it was for us anyway. I took a picture from our lunch spot, back up towards where we came down. Oddly enough, the angle's pretty close to the Google Earth image.


That lake is Cottonwood Lake #5, with its unique name and neat landscaping.


The trail led between #5 and #4, which came into view next.


Almost at Cottonwood Lake #1, where we had lunch on the first day, Bob told us to look back at where we came. We had a great alternate view of Mt. Langley with a meadow and lake in the foreground.


From here it was a pretty basic hike back, although as I've mentioned before I suffered from the "end of hike" thing where the last few miles seem to take forever. I'm sure it's 100% psychological, but here's something interesting: at one point we barely started to gain elevation when my heart rate jumped to the levels I'm at when I'm jogging. I'm talking 156 to 160bpm. I'm thinking it was simple fatigue, but it affected me quite heftily.

Back at Rob's car we fenagled our equipment and ourselves in and were making plans to shower and have a nice dinner, then a good night's sleep before heading home. Life, as always, had other plans.

When we got into cell phone range and were able to call the outside world, Rob got the news: his sister had passed away a few days prior, and there had been no way to contact us. This demanded his immediate attention, so he made the decision to head right back. He told his wife we were coming home around 5:30pm.

We gassed up the vehicles, grabbed a bite at Carl's Jr. and headed out. I stayed with Rob so I could keep him occupied during the 8+ hour trip home. We ended up stopping every half hour to an hour for Rob and Bob to get enough shut-eye to get along. With all the stops it was almost a 10-hour drive and once in town, Bob dropped me off at my house. I walked in the front door at 4:30am on Friday morning.

Even without summiting Whitney, the trip was a success. We climbed Mt. Langley, which tops out at over 14,000 feet, and in the process hiked 42 miles, 8291' of elevation gain, 8318' of loss, and burned roughly 24,000 calories. We also have an excuse to come back next year: Whitney 2009!