My wonderful hiking partners and I make it to the top of Mount Whitney despite all that moisture!! Lots of hugs and next up: hot cocoa. L2H completed, and for Abram (left), the H2L2H (highest to lowest to highest)!
My third summit in three years, and third time sleeping on the top. I climbed four 14ers this summer: Mt. Sill, Mt. Tyndall, Mt. Williamson, and Whitney.
Backstory: Abram had no Microspikes (crampons) and so I lent him one of mine after his makeshift ziptie “spikes” failed (they break quickly in the cold). We skipped the icy 99 switchbacks and went straight up the Trailcrest chute, each with one spiked foot. When half-way up, we spotted a beautiful woman headed down, alone. That gave the boys courage to continue, whereas prior to that they seemed pretty leery of a snowy summit. One benefit of growing up in Alaska is I seem to naturally have better footing on ice and snow, more confidence anyway, and snow isn’t alien. Summitting Whitney with snow we just had to be pretty sure 1) a storm wouldn’t come in and 2) we had the gear to stay warm. We could have done better by having Microspikes for everyone, but Abram was on a tight budget and we made do. Luckily it worked out.
