Spent Saturday and Sunday up at Onion Valley just N of Whitney with hikes above 10k to acclimate. Drove over to the Portal Sunday afternoon and set up a short camp.

We weren’t sleeping and were looking to extend our odds so we left at 12am. Weather was warm and started in shorts and no jacket. First trail snow patch was just above Mirror lake. People have been walking directly up visible by a slight path but after putting on micro spikes and following up it was obvious you could walk around a boulder climbers left and meet the trai easy w no snow. Short dicey part just above Trail Side Meadow. Used spikes and ice axe pole as exposed to climbers left. ( on the way down hikers were saying a ranger said to hike up and around as it was close to collapsing- we didn’t see an alt way back and crossed again. Worth asking about). A couple of easy patches up to Trail Camp.

We waited for sunrise to start the switchbacks. The bottom dozen or so have snow on corners with everyone rock hopping up to the next switchback. Ice was present along w a lot of flowing water on the trail. The cables can now be safely and easily passed squeezing behind the 6ft high wedge blocking the trail. The steps climbers right were still very icy and the cables were bent out over the cliff- no reason to no stay left VS ducking the cables. Micro spikes again for the last long traverse to trail crest. Deep trough so helps.

Last snow was traversing Whitney right before turning right/East to summit. We used micro spikes but others did not. Great weather and views amazing!!!

We followed the trail back down the main summit and this put us below the traverse above, that everyone else was using. This had ~200 of snow w more exposure so micro spikes and ice axe again

Same but slushy conditions down on switchbacks. We decided not to glissade due to not seeing anyone else doing it, limited experience. We did run into a lot of patches of heavy mosquitoes from Outpost Camp to the portal. We were slow down and finished at 8pm. A long but amazing night/day/evening

Big thanks to other posters that helped our trip

Last edited by Aaron B; 07/16/19 09:28 PM.