West of the crest (JMT), I don't think a Ham is going to do you a lot of good. There are places you can get out, hitting a repeater in the Whites or Inyo, but it's pretty spotty. One of the Sequoia backcountry rangers carries one (Yaesu) but he knows all the magic spots he can transmit from. If you want to get the occasional location message out, then the SPOT is the way to go. The same for an emergency. The SPOT will transmit from many more locations than a Ham radio will.
Except on the crest and the east side, cell phones are pretty useless for most all of the JMT.
George
