Mt Whitney Zone Forums General Discussion mountaineers' route rock fall

I hiked/climbed the Mt Whitney Mountaineers' Route last Friday and was warned by a rep in the USFS Visitor Center of a recent rock fall and that the MR had been changed.

A couple of returning hikers also warned me of this. One said that the rock fall made moving up the scree easier.

Here is what I encountered just above and to the right of the notch. This is the first time I had gone up the MR. Was that big rock blocking the route there before?



I found that there were many places where the rocks were very unstable. A lot were tumbling down the chute.

I had to turn around due to an impending thunderstorm.

Was there any snow or ice?

There was black ice on the 'easy walk off' detour, but I did not witness it because I never continued on due to the dark clouds that were suddenly descending. A returning climber warned me about it. He said he would never take that detour even with crampons and an ice axe. He used the final 400 climb to summit.

Snow was evident in the shadow area of the chute, but was easily avoidable.

There was also snow/ice in the rock basin along the trail above Upper Boy Scout Lake, but that is normally not crossed -- unless you are climbing Keeler Needle like some climbers I met had planned to do that day.

I think my dog and I passed you guys. My pup and I summited and rescued some folks on the East Buttress on 7/17, we did Russell on 7/18, and left Iceberg Lake on Thursday. Sounds like a discussion we had with everyone who was attempting MR for safety sake. Glad you made it up. Were you part of the group of friends at Iceberg?

On this day I was solo, but last week I was with a party of three and we added another at Iceberg Lake. Didn't see any dogs.

Glad you summited safely and helped people out along the way!