Hello,

We're a group of 5 girlfriends from Fremont CA planning a day hike up Mt. Whitney on Friday Sep 15th. We've been training for the past 3 months or so with weekend hikes around the bay area. The longest we've hiked is 18 miles with an elevation gain of 4K feet. We're in fairly good shape ... hike about 6 miles 3K feet elevation almost every weekend and run 10-15 miles a week.

Our Plan - Stay the night before at Mammoth and drive next morning to Lone Pine. Get permit, rest/nap, dinner at 8:30 pm and hit the trail head at 11pm. We hope to summit by 8-9am next morning and return by 6pm .

A few Qs -
1. I was reading about the "old" trail vs. the "new". where do the trails diverge? Which one is recommended? Is 1 longer than the other?

2. We plan to carry 4L of water - 3L in bladder and 1L in water bottles. Is that too much, too less?

3. I've been hiking with my favorite Keen hiking boots, they are unfortunately not water proof. Should I take along water shoes for portions of the trail where we will encounter water? I hate to change my hiking boots 2 weeks before go date.

4. We will be keeping a close eye on weather. Should we have a turn around time or a cut-off? For whatever reason we are delayed or go slow, should we have a time we turn around. Say T-storms are expected at 1pm, it takes 3 hours from summit to tree cover, if we arent at the summit by 10am, turn around to avoid running into bad weather? Or am I over thinking this?

Any tips will be appreciated smile!!

Thanks!!