AUGUST 1997
by Phil*

The boys get an early start on the final day. It's barely light out as we slowly crawl out of the warmth of our tents into a cold, blustery morning. The wind blew hard all night making it very difficult to sleep. Tired but anxious to head out, we grab a bite for breakfast and set about the task of breaking camp. BerrisBob amuses himself by feeding Pop Tarts to some brave little birds, which have no qualms about taking the food right out of his hand. Breaking camp in the relentless wind proves to be no picnic. During a brief lapse of attention, Cesar's tent blows away down off the rock ledge and neatly comes to rest upside down in a small pond about 50 yards away. Who knows, had it not been for the pond, the tent may have blown all the way back to Crabtree Meadow. All bundled up like it's the dead of winter, we begin the laborious 2500 foot ascent of switchbacks to the summit.


Where are we?

The trail splits off here- to the left is the summit, two horizontal miles and another 500 vertical feet up. This last section is done without packs, having stashed them at the junction. They will be picked up on the way back from the top, before heading down to Whitney Portal, 8.7 miles off to the right, and about 6,000 bone jarring feet below.
The feeling without packs is initially misleading and Phil and BerrisBob start off a bit overzealously before quickly running out of breath in this oxygen-poor environment, forcing them to adopt a more moderate pace. In this picture, taken just past the junction, Phil and Cesar are just visible in the center right of the picture, with the crest of Mt. Whitney in brilliant sunshine in the background.


Looking through the gap of Keeler Needle toward OutPost Camp 2500 feet below in the foreground, and beyond to Whitney Portal, the day's final destination, 6,000 leg-numbing feet below.


At last we reach the summit - 14,496 feet and change, marked by this placard. Note that the topo map (reproduced above in the "Where Are We" cell) lists the summit as 14,944 feet. Two confirmed deaths have occurred due to this error, when two semi-conscious, oxygen-deprived hikers walked off the edge and to their deaths 2500 feet below, while trying to find the trail to take them the remaining 448 feet to 'the top'. (Just kidding).
Barry poses at the entrance of the shelter at the top. This building was erected as a shelter against bad weather- especially lightning. However, several people have died inside when the building was struck by lightning (not kidding this time). One such death occurred in 1988 when Tom, Phil, and BerrisBob were backpacking nearby at Florence Lake. Though you can't read it in this photograph, the sign on Barry's left says in effect "If lightning is nearby, DO NOT SEEK SHELTER INSIDE THIS BUILDING. PROCEED IMMEDIATELY DOWN THE MOUNTAIN." Let me just say that that's easier said than done!


A fine example of 'Your Tax Dollars at Work'- the Park Service has constructed an outhouse (fondly referred to as 'the Hutch') at the summit. Here, loathing government waste, Cesar prepares to 'Do the Deed'.
Tradition states that Thor, Norse god of thunder, be simultaneously appeased and ridiculed upon reaching the summit. The group dutifully abides with Phil dancing the 'Jig of Appeasement', BerrisBob grabbing one of the shelter's lightning rods in defiance, and the other members looking like idiots.


This is it- the view from the top. From left to right we look to the north toward Mt. Russell, east overlooking Owens Valley, south toward Mt. McAdie, and west toward Mt. Young.

We begin the agonizing descent, with thoughts of Cokes and cheeseburngers dancing in our heads. The scenery changes dramatically from barren rock to charming forrest as we descend. We run into pistol packing Ranger Rick (not his real name) in a small meadow about halfway down:

Ranger: "How are you guys doing today?"
We: "Fine." (We lied- we were hurting severely from the tortuous descent at this point).
Ranger: Smalltalk and questions about where we were coming from- typical stuff for rangers.
We: We make smalltalk back and tell him where we started and that we are finishing at Whitney Portal.
Ranger: "Do you have your permit?"
Phil: "Sure, we have it right here." Phil opens his pack and fishes out the permit. We're all feeling pretty smug that we have it and it now seems worthwhile that we turned around to get it the first day when Phil left it at his house.
Ranger: "Did you read the permit?"
Phil: "Well yeah, kind of." Now we're expecting him to start quizzing us on it or something.
Ranger: "The reason I ask is that the permit says 'Permit Not Valid Unless Signed', and I noticed that it wasn't signed."
Phil: Mutters some lame excuse, then offers "I'll sign it as soon as we get to the Portal."
Ranger: "I'm sorry, that's not good enough. I'm afraid I'm going to have to shoot you." (Just kidding). Actually, he's cool about it and makes some more smalltalk before bidding us goodbye. Angered that he didn't kill us, and that we still have a couple thousand grueling vertical feet to go, we proceed, with Cokes and cheeseburgers taking sole possession of our thoughts.


The descent from the top is excruciatingly painful with each ankle-twisting, knee-wrenching step. But did they really think this stylish waterfall at the halfway point was going to take our minds off the pain for more than 11.5 femto-seconds?
Whitney Portal- The End. Did someone say cheeseburgers and Cokes?

The ride home proceeds without incident- with one exception. Traveling up highway 395 we encounter a hastily erected yet official looking sign saying "Random Vehicle Drug Inspection Ahead." We can see several miles up the road, but there are no signs of any official activity. Across the highway in the other direction, however, there are a couple of state police cars that have pulled over a couple of vehicles. I surmise that there really is no inspection ahead of us, and that the cops just hang out on the other side of the road waiting for drug laden vehicles to pull U turns to avoid the inspection, whereupon they are promptly busted- an interesting concept. We continue along and after a good many miles do indeed run into the forewarned inspection in two or three separate locations. At one point one trooper pulls out behind us and we dread the possibility of needlessly having to empty our packs for their amusement. The trooper soon does a U turn however, possibly after getting a whiff of our multi-day backpacking stench. To celebrate we fire up a big Bob Marley joint (just kidding).

Phil hits the Cruise Control, and after a few more hours we're back to our old boring lives again. 'Til next year?

* This section was originally supposed to have been documented by Phil. Usually not one for lack of words; it seems, however, that Phil was unable to pen any thoughts to this section of the travelogue. This chore has thus fallen on BerrisBob, who I dare say has performed splendidly in this matter.


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