I am laughing at loud over the early day hike start comment. You are certainly right. 8:30 pm is an early start for a dayhike. But it is not as early as 4:00 pm---the time we started on our first attempt in August! The plan then was to get to Lone Pine Lake and take a nap at the Lake front until midnight. We even had mylar blankets. The problem was neither one of us could sleep and we both got cold. So we started up the mountain at 8:00 pm.
We started so early because we really wanted to have a firm turnaround time of 12:00 noon.
On the second trip: we arrived at Trail Camp at 1:30 am. We didn't leave Trail Camp until 3:30 am! I mentioned I stupidly left my water filter at home. My thought process was that I carried an extra fleece instead to make it weight neutral. And the August trip had shown up there was plenty of water and trip reports here reported that water was available on Switchback 23. I will NEVER again go on a long dayhike without my water filter. I suppose we could have taken water from the lake unfiltered but along the edges of the lake it really didn't look that great---it was hard enough finding a spot where it was not green or muddy.
Well that decision basically cost us two hours. We stumbled and bumbled around for two hours trying to figure out what to do about water. I almost compounded the decision by making a tragic choice: I suggested we go up to Switchback 23 for water! That would have been disasterous because that water was frozen so we would have had to come all the way back to Trail Camp. I suppose I would have sent my dad ahead and I would have headed back to Camp for water.
So that still leaves us 7 1/2 hours from Trail Camp to the Summit. I can't really explain why it took so long. Although I should have mentioned that both of us fell asleep somewhere along the way on Trail Crest. I don't think it was that long (10 minutes or so) but by mom jokes that we probably slept for an hour or two!
I am laughing on how silly this sounds. It really isn't advisable to take a Red Eye from Alaska and attempt a "day" hike of Mt. Whitney two days later. The sleep deprivation is just tough. But we did it!
Finally Steve and I already discussed the marathon question. Based on our circumstances and the way my dad and I did Whitney: the marathon is way easier! The combination of sleep deprivation, elevation and time elasped make it the hardest thing I've ever done.
