Mt Whitney

Last week, a friend and I summited Mt Whitney, the highest mountain in the continental US at 14,500 ft, second only to Mt McKinley in Alaska. While we lucked out with the last campground at Whitney Portal and the last two canceled permits, a thunderstorm was predicted for our planned climb. Sunday, we did the 5 hour drive up and set up camp, while Monday we did a short hike at altitude. Based on the predicted thunderstorm, we left at 1:30am to increase our odds of reaching summit before any bad weather. With headlamps, we hiked the first 4+ hours in complete darkness as even the moon wasn't out. We finally reached the summit around 10am, after 8.5 hours. We spent about :30 on top resting before starting the trek down. About halfway down, 3 hours in, the thunderstorm hit showering us with thunder, lightning, rain and hail for the last 6 miles and 3 hours. Extremely tired and wet, we reached base at about 4:30, 15 hours later. Over a crappy meal down in Lone Pine, we decided to forgo the rest of our planned trip to Mammoth in exchange for riding motorcycles in the desert and an early return to SD. Quite a climb with some amazing views. I highly recommend the climb, which can be done in one day or multiple based on backpacking camp sites. Here's a few pictures starting with sunset, summit to thunderstorm. Enjoy.