Sorry for the delay guys. We hiked White Mountain Peak on Sunday, November 19th. The trail had a bit of snow, but not enough in my opinion to not hike it. However, the challenge is that the road up to the start of the trail is snowed in about 4.5 miles out from the start of the trail. For those of you that may have done the hike before, there is a sign at a fork in the road that says 4 miles to the start of the the trail to the left and continuing straight 1 mile to another location which I can't recall. Although the road was too snowed in for our 4 wheel drive Kia Sorento, a lifted truck or jeep would easily make it. There are only maybe 2 stretches of the road, that are heavily snowed in. However, it was easy to hike around that, as most of the time there were areas where the ground was visible or the snow was shallow.
The hike was a blast. It was a cold night camping prior to the hike, though the hike itself was not too cold, ~25-30 degrees with a mild wind ~15mph. We left the campsite at about 7:30am in the morning. At 1pm we had just passed the small dome structure that was about a half mile past the Bancroft facility. I'm not sure how far it is to the peak from that point, but it didn't look like more than 1.5-2 miles. I decided to turn around at this point as my girlfriend was a little under the weather and hiking back through the snow once the sun started setting behind some of the mountains did not sound fun. All in all our hike was 15.5 miles. My garmin Fenix calculated the distance from the start of the trailhead (bathroom) to only be 2.75 miles to where we turned around. I find it hard to believe that the peak was still another 4 miles from that point as we could see it and the trail was visible. I will post pictures a little later to show where we turned around. I have read various estimates about the trail distance being between 5.5 and 7 miles one way. That would mean at a minimum we were 2.75 miles away from the peak. It's possible but that certainly did not look that far at all.
All in all the hike is very doable in a day, even with the additional 9 miles that are added from the road being snowed in. My girlfriend was struggling due to being under the weather and at one point it took us 2 hours to cover just over 2 miles. I have no doubt I could have made it to the summit by 1pm from where we started had I been on my own.
There was another hiker returning to his car when we arrived to where the trail was snowed in. He had summitted the mountain that day. With the additional distance it took him about 12 hours. I think if you are well conditioned, you can do this hike in 10 hours with the added distance. I will caution you that the additional miles make the hike down almost as challenging as the hike up. this is because those last 4.5 miles that are snowed in are basically rolling hills at altitude between 11,200 and 12,000 ft. The snow in some portions make it tough, but they are short stretches. For the most part you can find shallow snow or find patches of dirt to walk on.
What beautiful views of the Sierra Nevada! Looking across the valley I believe I spotted Mount Whitney and Mount Williamson. Even without knowing, taking in the beauty of the tremendous mountain range was breathtaking. I will certainly go back next summer and do the hike. Frankly I think that would be a good hike to do a couple of days before Mount Whitney.
Thank you all for your advice and recommendations. I am at work so I typed quickly and spelled out my thoughts quickly. Let me know if you have questions. I will try and get some pictures up soon.
BTW, with how the weather has been since my hike, I am sure the trail head is reachable in any 4 wheel drive car now.
