Mt. Whitney - The rest of the story



Mt. Whitney is the tall one.  Notice the haze?  Yeah, us too!



So, if you read my last post, you know my son Brendan and I did not make it to the summit of Mt. Whitney.  Very bummed, but due to some (*&B#!* forest fire (caused by lightening a couple weeks prior), smoke was engulfing the Mt. Whitney trail - and just our luck it was the same days we were climbing it (I knew I should have bought a lottery ticket in L.A.).

Brendan and I started climbing at 5:30am (in retrospect, this was a tad too late).  Found this sign and off we go....

That'd  be the moon!

Sunrise.  Uh, yeah...notice all that smoke in the valley??

Brendan on the trail as the sun was rising

One of many streams we crossed.  Yep, that's me and my 21
lbs of badass backpack - killing my shoulders!

Approaching tree-line

Loved this pretty little meadow.  Until now, my heel had been doing
very, VERY well.  Did I mention it was doing very well?  Around this point, about
3-hours in, I started noticing some annoyances with it, but nothing I too
unmanageable.  YES!!!

We arrived at "Base Camp" (it's actually called "Trail Camp", but since it is where we were going to be parked for an evening of sub-freezing-to-death temps, Base Camp is what the name became) exactly 5-hours after we started (ok, 5:01 to be precise).  Not speedy, but since Brendan was carrying the bulk of the load (he got the tent and most of the food.  Hey, it was freeze-dried, it barely weighted 10 oz total!), we stopped for a few breaks so he could get the pack off.  We found this little gem of solid granite for a campsite at 12,000' in 30mph winds. Joyous!

View from our campsite when we first arrived, sweet, huh?  Still blue skies where
we still needed to climb. 

Home for the night. 

We got to base camp, elevation 12,000' (6.3 miles) about 10:30am and it was windy and cold and we just plopped our tent on the first granite surface that didn't look like it contained a thousand rocks underneath.  At the time, the skies to the West, where we still needed to climb another 5 miles and 2500', looked clear.  But we could smell it - the crazy wind was causing the smoke from the Sequoia fires to move in - fast!  2-hours later, the camp site area was filled with smoke!

View of Whitney from our campsite 2-hours after we first arrived.
NOTICE the freaking bad, bad, BAD haze now??  UGH!

We hung out at camp for a couple hours so Brendan could unload his pack here, make some lunch, and I soaked my foot on that blanket of snowy ice.  My foot was complaining after being on it for 5-hours with a heavy pack, but it was behaving much better than I thought and I was beyond thrilled for it.  After I took my shoe off and let it rest a couple hours (waaaaay too long since we still had 5 miles up and 5 miles down back to camp), when I put my shoe back on I was ecstatic that the heel and ankle felt fantastic!  I was so excited to get going and when we left about 12:30pm to head up to the summit, I could tell Brendan wasn't doing well.  He was dragging as we were climbing and finally after an hour leaving base camp, at 13,200', I called the climb.  He was coughing horribly and really gasping to get air. 

Down we went, back to Base Camp.  It was about 3:00pm when we reached camp and by now the smoke was so heavy at camp.  Bleh!  Our friends arrived (they left later in the morning as they were not going to summit until the following day, unlike us who wanted to summit on the first day - due to my heel not really liking going downhill!) just as we got down so we chatted with them awhile.

Brendan and I.  Yes, I'm freezing!  And that's our
tent way in the background

Friends Kettie and Lynne

Lynne and her two brothers and Kettie.  Lots of yucky, stupid smoke!

Me and Kettie...on our way to find a "rock" for a porta-potty

Beings it was like early afternoon, and we're at camp with virtually nothing really to do (who the hell wants to drag up cards or books in the pack - that's excess weight for crying out loud!  Never mind our BA friends who carried 30 lb packs full of Pringles, Oreos and M&Ms - I mean, we can just mooch off of their snacks!) and I am not the best "camper" in the world, especially on hard granite, I tried to talk Brendan into going back down to trail head, get in our car, and head to the nearest hotel with comfy pillows and beds.  But nooooo, the kid couldn't wait to spend the night at 12,000'.  I had a migraine like you wouldn't believe from the lovely air quality so just as well we didn't hike for more hours I guess - and this whole trip was for his 16th birthday, so I downed a few hundred Advil and hung out in the tent awhile.

Kate: THIS is camping.  Just sayin'

 While Brendan had dinner - freeze-dried yum (aka: freeze-dried yuck):

About 7:00pm, after we chatted all we could chat and with nothing else to do, I decided to go to bed.  I slept horribly the night before (actually, the entire trip - bleh!) so I actually relished the thought of plopping on my rock hard bed.  Combated with 4 layers of long-sleeved winter running shirts and one 20 degrees sleeping bag, I laid awake most of the night .... shivering.  Worst night's sleep e v e r!!!

It took me awhile to crawl out of my sleeping bag in the morning since it was so cold but who could pass up breakfast:

Sitting at the breakfast table with the camp stove at my feet, heating my oatmeal.  At least at 12,000',
water boils fast and I got something warm in me quickly

Seriously amazing blue skies when we woke, the smoke moved out over night.  YAY.  Brendan and I discussed trying to attempt the summit on day 2 but we ruled it out: We were both freaking exhausted, my foot probably was not going to handle 16 miles and more than 12-hours of hiking in one day, and by now we were just over the whole summit thing.

 So we packed up, loaded the backpacks back on (oh my goooood, my shoulders hurt!) and Brendan and I headed down as our friends headed up to the summit.

These little purple flowers were simply amazing

Mirror Lake

Still a little smoke in the valley, but overall much clearer on day 2

It took us almost as long to get down as it did to get up.  We took our time early on, admiring all the flowers and the lakes along the way, but after about 3-hours, I just wanted to get down.  It was getting very warm and my feet were starting to ache.  Amazingly, my foot was being semi-cooperative and not giving me too much grief, but overall my feel just simply hurt.  A lot!  And I wanted off that mountain and to the hotel!  :)

I should have taken some pictures of Brendan and I when we finally reached the bottom but the only strength I had left was to drag my backpack on the ground to the car, walk back to the trail head, and order a hamburger from the Mt. Whitney portal store at the base of the trail.  It was a.m.a.z.i.n.g!!!!

Though the summit wasn't reached, I slept like total crap, I almost shivered to death and my feet, shoulders and back felt like they'd been put through a meat grinder.... I had an absolutely amazing experience.  It was so hard and humbling, and I was so tired afterwards but I reached out and explored my edge and reach for that higher bar, something out of my comfort zone.  And I survived.  And I even smiled. 

And I got to do it with my son. 

Absolutely priceless!

Next up: Death Valley (I promise, not so many pictures...but a great A.D.D. moment), blogger meet-up and the wonderful hospitality at Meg's, shoe reviews, a 195 mile relay, heel updates, an upcoming mountain adventure.. or two (no, it's not Whitney), a job announcement, and of course - many more answers to those questions.  I think I'm good for blog posts until Thanksgiving! :)  (and I apologize for my lack of blog appearance lately, what a whirlwind of life craziness upon my return home).

Run strong, Friends!  I'm off to do hill repeats in the morning with ya!  Finally!