Hi Steve!
Thanks for posting the video on my behalf, I've been meaning to get around to posting the video and a trip report for a while, life just gets in the way! My original plan was to ski the Middle Teton that week but my partners had to bail and I din't feel comfortable skiing that on my own. I am very familiar with Whitney, been to the top about 10 times, first time was in 1997 when I was 19. I'd never been in the winter and it looked like it would be an adventure. I thought about doing the Mountaineers Route but then I saw Kurt Wedberg's post about avalanche conditions and thought better of going up the chute on my own. Figured the Main Trail would be a little safer.
I left Salt Lake City on March 12th at 11 AM (had just worked an ER shift until 4 AM that morning). Got to Lone Pine around 8 PM. I loaded up my skis, boots and pack for an overnight onto my old mountain bike then mostly pushed it up the summer road to the Trailhead. Took me about 1 hour 45 minutes to get to the trailhead.
I switched over to ski boots and started hiking up the Main Trail, I was able to put my skis on for most of the rest of way after passing the North Fork turnoff. I made pretty quick time up to Trail Camp on skis, took me about 4 hours from the Trailhead to Trail Camp. I made camp and slept the night, it was pretty cold and windy that night, probably got down to about 5 degrees.
I left Trail Camp the next morning at 6 AM. I was hoping to keep my skis on and skin the whole way up to Trail Crest but the chute to the right of the switchbacks was pretty wind scoured and icy so I left the skis at the base and just boot packed all they way up to Trail Crest. Took me 2 hours to get to Trail Crest.
When I turned the corner and wrapped around the backside things started getting pretty icy. I finally came across a 60 degree bulge of blue ice covering the entire trail with a straight drop down over sharp rocks below it. It would have been easy if I had a partner and rtope to belay across but it was just too risky by myself. Made the easy decision to turn around and ski back to camp.
I packed up camp and started skiing down. I would have made great time but I got too tempted by a nice looking steep chute to ski just south of the turnoff to get back to Mirror Lake. I thought it was going to go, could see the meadows down by Outpost Camp. Unfortunately right in the middle of the chute was a nice little 100 foot cliff. I was forced to take the skis off and boot pack back out about 700 vertical feet. Stupid!
I made it back down to the Trailhead, loaded up the skis and boots onto the backpack and was able to cruise down the road. Took me exactly 17 minutes to get down the road! Got to the car around 4 PM and started driving home!
It was a great adventure, Mt. Whitney is a magical place, wish I lived closer!
