Mt Whitney Zone Forums General Discussion Whitney Main Trail Conditions 2015 (Out-of-Date)

mgl's post above says switch backs are passable (though they themselves took chute). The ranger's office this morning said people are returning back from cables. Do you know of any first hand accounts or photos of taking switchbacks?We have a day permit for Monday.. and are trying to make a decision.

great thread, btw.

NOAA Weather warning this weekend

Are these folks wearing "wind pants"?

Raghu,
From the previous posts, it looks like the hike up to Trail Camp is pretty much clear of snow. Even if the switchbacks were impassable, I would make the hike just to enjoy the trip up to trail camp (which is very good hike in itself). Just my opinion though.
I have day permit for next weekend and will probably still make the trip just to get to trail camp and enjoy the hike.

Ernest, I agree with the sentiment

The concern is that second attempt is going to take quite a bit of time. So if we go now and not be able to make it to the summit, it might be a few years before next attempt. Alternately if we postpone our visit, we might come back much earlier (or attempt Shasta this year itself)

Hi,
Few of my friends have permits for 13th June Saturday. We are two permits shy of the entire group. Is there any forum where I can request people if they have additional permits to help?

I talked to those folks Saturday @ noon. They had come up the chute from the MMWT. After they left, it was just our group (which had come up the MR).

Then, as we were getting ready to leave, some PCTers showed up. As you can see in the photo above, the MMWT group had snow pants, micro-spikes + poles, but the PCTers just had their mini-shorts, trail runners & poles.

I didn't take any photos of the switchbacks, but they looked like they still had snow (ie distinct white lines). I also didn't see any figures coming up.

As for the MR, it was about as good as it gets for true alpine conditions:

ajwani, there are always no-shows and unused permits available the day before the hike. Read up on the Wilderness Permit Options link (box 6 especially) (Link above on the left). When you check-in to pick up your existing permits, you can likely add more slots, and they are free! Also see the suggestions in the thread Are you camping at Trail Camp on July 7 and 8?

One wrote: "My pants are REI water resistance"

Another: "my pants are just normal Kuhl Hiking Pants. Nothing special for the wind or cold. The weather was actually pretty warm for the summit."

I'm going to be up there in shorts and gaiters. Shouldn't be too bad...

given the NOAA weather warning, would a tuesday/weds or thurs summit be the most advisable for this upcoming week?

Hello all, I sumitted yesterday (6/2) as a day hike. I will give a quick update and then a down and dirty later.

Went up the switchbacks, yes they have snow on them, yes you need crampons to make life easy.

Came back down the chute, glissading. I do not recommend plunge stepping.

I did that because the people coming up the sb's said they were starting to melt and were sketchy.

PCT side, people were coming up with yaktrax and shorts/trail running shoes. I used crampon and ice axe on the sb's and then poles once I got to trail crest.

The snow really slows you down on the sb's and I had 2 in my party get AMS so they had to turn around.

I will post more later, this should give you a better idea of things.

Thanks for the update Cronus!
Would you advise on using Yaktrax or crampons for the sb's? Although in a week it might not even matter.

Trying to get an estimate of how steep is chute. how does it compare to a solid black daimond slope? Even if switchbacks are (barely) passable, chute might be a better option.

Aslo wondering if ace axe and microspikes might be enough, or if crampons would certainly be recommended. We have day permit for Monday.

Thanks for the update Cronus4. If you were doing it again today, would you take chute or switch backs going up? looking forward to more updates.

So, micro's might work on sb's but it could get dicey, especially since it's supposed to dump snow this Friday, so depends on when you go.

Steepness of the chute...hmmm, definitely not a BD, but it's pretty steep, you pick up some good speed glissading, and I had to regularly brake and even self arrest a couple times.

As for chute vs switchbacks it depends on your fitness. The chute is really going to tax you, although if you hit it early in the am the snow should be pretty firm and you might not post-hole as much as you might later in the day.

I can't tell you if I would have taken the chute if I had to do it again, because honestly I didn't venture over there to look at the conditions, there were a bunch of people on the sb's making it up, and none on the chute, so I figured I'd go with the flow.

Thanks. It is interesting that most people headed up SBs. Our trip is on Monday.

Perhaps. However, my take on it is that from Trail Camp you can tell if people are on the switchbacks, whereas the condition/grade/issues with the Chute require about 20 minutes of hiking uphill to make a call. So, opting for the SB's is the expedient thing to attempt initially.

Cables on 6/2. at this point I didn't have on crampons, I put them on when I got to the guy you see at the far side of the pic.

Agreed.