I will be camping at Whitney Portal Campground on July 18, 19 and thought I'd ask any of you who might have camped here a few questions primarily related to bears:

1. We have a 4 year old, so I'm concerned about bears and safety for my son. Any suggestions?
2. Ice chests - Should they be stored in bear containers, if so how big of an ice chest will they hold?
3. Any issues with having a BBQ?
4. Anything else I should be aware of?

Thanks.

1. Keep your son in sight at all times. Do not let him wander alone.

2. Ice chests in the bear lockers always. Those bear lockers are huge. You can store a lot of gear in them.

3. Forget the BBQ. Be a glutton, eat at the Portal Store and let Doug do the cooking! Heck, maybe Doug will let your son assist in the store. You can BBQ anything you want.

4. Scorpions. If you like to fish, there is trout in the stream and in the Portal Pond.

Hope this helps...

Have fun.

1. Keep him under constant supervision. The campsites are nice, but it's rough terrain. My son had a blast, but his mother and I did not have so much fun following him around everywhere.

2. They have pretty big bear bins at each site. We have a big ice chest and it fit with our friends' ice chest and other food stores as well. For a normal size family for a weekend stay, storage shouldn't be an issue unless you go way overboard.

3. We didn't have any issues with a BBQ. We brought one and cooked chicken one night, and hamburgers/hot dogs another. We made sure we emptied the dripping catcher before bed, and we burned off as much as we could by leaving the BBQ on for a good 5-10 minutes after cooking. No issues at all.

4. There is plenty to do to have fun with the kids. Lots of places to walk and explore, the creek to mess around in. There are scorpions, I found that out on the trail just last week. Fishing is fun, there's a lot of trout in the little pond near the store. No wifi that I could find, but 3G coverage with Verizon was better this year than it was last year. Closer to the road, better coverage.

Have a great trip!

Hi !

Keep your campground clean. After meals, storage all food in the bear box. Your car must be food and food odor's free.
Use the camping trash cans.
Bears usually appears at dusk. I think I saw the same bear for 3 consecutive nights last year (end of July) at exactly the same time, between 8:30 and 9:00 pm at the family campground.
Normally people chase him making noise and the bear just escape to the woods.
You can check bear box size in this picture
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-qm7bB5wN0lw/TkBrU-vXPfI/AAAAAAAACtY/e4vWXgWVLSg/s1600/IMG_0437.JPG

Enjoy !

If we could just keep the bears in the bear boxes, everything would be so much easier.

I like the way you think, wagga! I was going to suggest putting the children in the bear boxes - then they are free to do whatever they like with no fear of getting injured by the wildlife!

I was afraid that suggestion might be frowned upon, though.

OK, the bears & the children in the bear boxes - might be unnecessarily tough on the bears, though.

Ha!!

All kidding aside - make sure you put your empty backpacks inside the bear box, or at least completely out of sight.

Last year at the portal, 2 of my friends left their completely empty backpacks in the back of my friend's pickup. I was coming back from the bathroom when it was pitch black, and almost crapped myself when I walked past the truck and a bear jumped out of the back of the truck after I apparently spooked it. I didn't scare it soon enough though, because he managed to chew up 2 perfectly good packs!

Thanks for all the great info. I've been coming to this site for the past year plus when I was preparing to hike Whitney for the first time. It is a wealth of information.

Last year we stayed in Lone Pine and spent a day around the Portal acclimating but 2 of the 5 in our group didnt' make it due to altitude sickness which is why we are camping this year. I did make it to the top with my oldest son and brother. Great experience but when I got down to the Portal said I'd never do it again....but here I am, excited and ready to go with the same group and a few more.

Thanks again for all the great advice and the picture of the locker.

One more thing....

Sites 43 and 44 are especially high bear traffic areas due to their proximity to stream and woods. These sites are at the end of the road.

Trust me.

That's Great! We have site 41 on July 17th. I guess we'll see too :/ All gear goes in the Box as always.

You might want nose plugs depending on which way the wind blows...your site is next to a pit toilet...great bear deterrent...there is a water spigot...

You may want to park your vehicle and look around at 43 or 44 to see if they are "available." People cancel their reservations at the last minute. The dates of the reservations are on the placards at each site.

lol, no wonder it was open. Nothing like the sound of slamming toilet doors and dropped seats at 0-dark-30. Spigot...as long as there's no cross connection. Thanks for the info on the adjacent sites. I'll look into that when we get there.

No cross connection...the signs at the spigot say to not wash your hands...puh-leeeeeeeeeeeze...

Talking to my wife she wanted to know if there are showers near by>

I believe there is one available for a few bucks at the Portal Store. I've heard it's not the cleanest, but that's to be expected with the throngs of JMT hikers emerging from the trail and rinsing off their weeks of dirt.

A better option might be the hostel in Lone Pine - also owned by Doug who owns the Portal Store. I think it's maybe $5 for a shower there.

Hostel is a better bet...$5...

Another option is baby wipes between showers...

Just got back after spending 3 days at the Portal Campground with family and friends. Thanks to all for the great advice and information. The campground was great and enough can't be said about Fred and Sher who run the campground. VERY helpful and nice. We had 3 sites but were spread all over yet they found some way to get us three together. Had so much fun we stayed an extra day hiking, fishing, and just enjoying the area.

We (my son, friend/son, brother, and nephew) also summitted on the 19th despite the fact that it was really windy and cold when we reached Trail Camp. Pushed on and the weather got better. It was the first time summitting for all but me. Everyone did great and had a great time. My wife and a few others hiked to Trail Camp and back too so almost everyone in our group was out on the mountain.

Thanks again to everyone.

Ps. My 4 year old hiked to lone pine lake again this year or "Mountain Whitney" as he calls it, to fish and play by the water. He loves it up there.