Road to Whitney portal was fine no issues at all in any car. Ice Axe + Crampons Did not use Snow Shoes My partner and I hiked up the Main Trail starting Friday (5/5/2017) at 11am. Trail head was clear of snow but about a mile in we could see snow on the trail. Now there was no trail visibility so we started following the foot prints in snow which were kind of everywhere but we just kept on following one set which basically went straight up. Needless to say it was pretty steep. But not scary steep. Deep snow, thigh high, started right before Mirror Lake. Again since the trail was not visible we made up own trail in the snow and went up the steep slope to the left of Mirror Lake. This was steeper than at the beginning of the main trail. This was a bit scary as the sun was shining hard making the snow softer, thigh deep at times. Thigh high snow all the way up to Trail Camp. We spent the night on rocks. It was not very cold but cloudy with STRONG winds. I had rocks on my tent to keep it in place. My shoes and socks were wet from trudging in deep snow so put on a new woolen pair. Left at 4am next morning for Chute. Shoes were relatively dry. Snow was firm, no problem waking over it. Could only see up to the point where the light from the headlamp reached. Started Chute without crampons and ice axe. Got up a little, before Chute went crazy steep we put crampons on took out ice axe. It took at 1hr30mins to get up the chute. I was SCARED but we did it. The fact that i could not see clearly how steep it was because of the dark helped me focus on my feet and ice axe. By the time we got to trail crest sun was rising at horizon. It was cloudy. I was just glad to have finished the Chute. By around 8 am we were at the summit. Trail Crest to summit was pretty simple although we were tired from the previous day. While coming back we slid down the Chute. Looking at it in the day made me realize how crazy steep it was. Even getting down was scary. My partner and I started climbing it down (head towards Trail Crest and feet towards the bottom of Chute). But this was putting a lot of stress on my quadriceps and it was a LONG way to go down. So i decided to slide down. Chute is so LONG. It took us considerable time to even slide down that steep slope (used my ice axe for braking). We were down at trail camp close to noon. Packed out tent and started hiking down. Sliding down Mirror lake was so much fun! Again the snow was soft now almost of the way down. Slipping/sliding often. Got back to the parking lot. Got back to the parking lot, from Trail Camp in about 3hr15mins. It was a relief from cold and wet socks.
